


Under the Skin

by Kittytoastnjam



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Angst and Drama, Bathroom Sex, Cheating, Childhood Friends, First Time, Fluff and Smut, Getting Together, Gratuitous Smut, Hotel Sex, Internalized Homophobia, Jealous Oikawa Tooru, M/M, Mild Kink, Phone Sex, Porn with Feelings, Rimming, Semi-Public Sex, Switching, Tsundere Iwaizumi Hajime, Unrealistic Sex, but also FEELINGS, sex with feelings, sucker
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-01-04
Updated: 2021-02-04
Packaged: 2021-03-14 11:07:32
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 37,721
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28544541
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kittytoastnjam/pseuds/Kittytoastnjam
Summary: Like a disease, Oikawa is under Iwaizumi’s skin.
Relationships: Iwaizumi Hajime/Oikawa Tooru
Comments: 30
Kudos: 87





	1. Part One

**Author's Note:**

> Look, we've been binging the absolute shit out of Grey's Anatomy, which I've never seen before. I'm way too into the drama, because my life is blessedly drama free. Anyway, if you've never seen it or aren't interested, a summary of the show is that everyone is having sex with and cheating on each other and it showboats as a hospital drama. 
> 
> These types of things are absolutely my guilty pleasure. Dramatic cheating stories. Ugh I'm trash, so share in my garbage.

Ayane is a perfect, sweet girlfriend, and Iwaizumi Hajime is cheating on her. 

He had not intended to be a piece of shit boyfriend. When he agrees to go out with her following her confident confession, Hajime is actually pretty enthusiastic. This is finally his chance. He has seen enough terrible boyfriend behavior from his best friend during their high school years to know exactly what not to do. In fact, even with no dating experience of his own, Hajime can confidently say that, of all the things one should not do to their girlfriend, cheating on them is pretty much the first thing on the list. 

Knowing this doesn’t do him any good, since he still finds himself naked in a bed not his own only four short weeks after getting his first girlfriend.

He startles and pulls the foreign sheets up to his chest when his phone begins to ring. Toward the nightstand he crawls, brushing aside a trendy pair of glasses- also not his- and grabs his cellphone. The caller ID greets him with a cheerful: *Suzuki Aya*

Hajime frowns at the musical device and its mocking screen until it goes quiet and dark. 

“Was that Ayane-chan?” a voice calls from the bathroom, and Hajime fumbles the phone in his haste to slam it back onto the nightstand. A moment later the source of the voice, one Oikawa Toru, saunters in and unwinds himself lazily on the bed. “Maybe you should’ve answered,” he suggests. “She’s going to get worried if you don’t.” 

Hajime doesn’t reply right away, too busy dragging wide eyes over the muscular, damp, and naked back of his best friend. “Why don’t you have clothes on?” he growls. 

“Two reasons,” the man in question informs, as he rolls over onto his back. Hajime averts his eyes to his lap where his dick is definitely not getting hard again under the sheets. “One: it’s my apartment and I can wear or not wear whatever I want. Two: you haven’t put anything on yet either, have you, Iwa-chan?” Hajime shifts his hands over his half-erection and prays Oikawa won’t notice. The only flaw in that plan is that, after fifteen years, Oikawa is to Iwaizumi’s embarrassment as a shark is to blood. He smells it a mile away and attacks with animal-like fervor. His brown eyes gleam in the lamplight and he bares his teeth in a wicked grin. “Call her back,” he orders.

“But—“

“It’ll be worthwhile,” Oikawa sings, and an enchanted Hajime has the phone to his ear a moment later. 

“Hey Iwaizumi!” comes Ayane’s bubbly voice through the phone. 

“H-hey Suzuki. Sorry I missed your call. I was in the bathroom.” He sees Oikawa, who has moved to curl up at his side, mouth the word ‘liar.’ Iwaizumi’s ensuing glare is ignored. He is, though; it’s why it annoys him so much. “What’s up?” he forces instead. 

“Oh, nothing! I just wanted to talk to you for a few minutes before bed,” she chirps. One of the things Hajime likes about Ayane is her honesty. She never seems embarrassed about speaking her mind, and he admires that quality in people. ‘What the fuck?’ he mouths at Oikawa, who proceeds to yank the blankets away from Hajime’s lap. He jerks his knees up in an attempt at modesty that only fuels Oikawa’s fire. ‘Keep talking,’ Oikawa mouths back.

“H-how was your day?” Hajime stammers obediently. Holy shit what is wrong with him? Since when does he do anything his stupid friend suggests? Oikawa situates himself in front of Hajime and pries his knees apart. The way the taller man eyes him makes him turn scarlet. ‘Good boy,’ Oikawa whispers, praise Hajime assumes is because of his ready erection, around which Oikawa wraps his slender fingers. 

It goes like this: Ayane, oblivious and hundreds of miles away, chatters about the holiday weekend she is spending with her family; Hajime, untrusting of his voice, offers the occasional noise to show his attentiveness; and Oi-fucking-kawa pumps his hand around Hajime’s dick grinning lazily as he listens to the conversation unfold. The man perks when he hears his name through the phone. “What have you and Oikawa been up to?” Ayane asks after she has finished a quick recap of her weekend.

“We did some volleyball training stuff mostly,” Iwaizumi answers, and that comes easily since it is the truth. It is everything after volleyball that he does not dare speak aloud. He swats at Oikawa’s head for good measure; the man loosens his grip on him and Hajime breathes a sigh of relief. 

“Ooh, did you tell him about that research doc you found on knee injury?” Ayane probes, and the ferocious glint returns to Oikawa’s eyes. Ayane is in Hajime’s classes, and she knows about Oikawa’s knee, and Oikawa has his pride. Hajime lets out a strangled gasp when Oikawa replaces his hands with his lips. 

“I-I totally forgot!” Hajime squeaks.

Ayane laughs, “You’re so cute, Iwaizumi. You don’t have to freak out! Just show him before you come back.” Oikawa makes a hum of acknowledgement that vibrates all the way up into Hajime’s skull. He digs his fingers into the base of Oikawa’s neck and leaves them there. 

“Oh, speaking of, I should let you go so you can sleep,” she says. “You’re coming back early right? If you want, I could meet you at the train.” 

“I don’t want to trouble you,” he mumbles. “I’ll, um, t-text you when I’m in?” It isn’t supposed to be a question, but his faculties are functioning less with every second Oikawa spends trying to suck his soul from his cock. 

At least Ayane giggles and agrees and Hajime bids her good night and hangs up the phone in a daze. “I’m going to hell,” he whispers. 

Oikawa draws away from Hajime’s dick with a wet pop that is as unnecessarily dramatic as he is. “Not without me, at least,” he grins.

Hajime wonders why such a stupid sentiment is so reassuring. Squeezing his eyes shut, he claws his fingers through his own hair and groans. This is crazy. He needs to have a serious conversation with Oikawa about whatever this is. Except that Oikawa had other ideas, evident when he throws his bare legs over Hajime’s hips and makes himself comfortable. “Oikawa,” Iwaizumi growls, a warning that his childhood friend is too aware of as an empty threat. 

“Why’d you tell her about my knee?” Oikawa asks as he cages Iwaizumi between his arms. It isn’t often that Iwaizumi notices the difference in their height, but he certainly feels small when Oikawa is so demanding. 

“She asked why I wanted to become an athletic trainer,” he admits.

The formidable Oikawa Toru softens, the edges around his eyes smoothing and tension in his arms growing slack. It is a vulnerability to which only Hajime is privy, and it makes Tōru so unbearably handsome that Hajime turns his gaze aside. Oikawa presses his nose into Hajime’s neck but the genuine smile he wears can still be felt against his skin. “Do you want to take care of me, Iwa-chan?” he teases. 

“No.” 

“Liar,” Oikawa smiles against his pulse before his teeth scrape the skin there. A twitch in response and Hajime’s hands find their way to Oikawa’s waist. He doesn’t dare look down, not when he can feel the brush of Oikawa’s cock against his, begging to be touched. “Should I take care of you instead?” Oikawa teases with a roll of his hips. Hajime lets his head fall back against the headboard and he shakes it vehemently, eyes still closed. 

Oikawa laughs, with Hajime’s heartbeat in his mouth and both their cocks in his hand. 

***

There is something about being separated for the first time in all their lives that leaves Hajime feeling overly sentimental when Oikawa launches himself at him at the train platform. “I missed you Iwa-chan!” he sobs into Iwaizumi’s shoulder like he isn’t three inches taller than him. 

“I missed you too,” Hajime grunts, keeping a firm hand around Oikawa’s back and the other on his overnight bag. “Let go of me, idiot. People are going to stare.” 

“Let them!” Oikawa declares, though he does oblige, separating far enough to look Iwaizumi up and down. Before the shorter man can object, Oikawa sweeps his bag onto his own arm and begins to drag Iwaizumi by the wrist like he did all the time when they were kids. “I can’t wait to show you my apartment! Let’s take a selfie for our moms. I have to call yours and tell her thanks for letting you spend some of the break with me!” he babbles. 

Before Oikawa moved away from Miyagi for college, Iwaizumi might have made a fuss about being too grown to be dragged through the streets. He supposes it is just the nostalgia of it all that sees him grin instead. By the time they traverse the Tokyo streets to the quietude of Oikawa’s apartment, Iwaizumi has been brought up to speed on the developments of Oikawa’s new team and classes. They already talk everyday, but being able to do so in person is so much better in a way he hasn’t realized until now. 

It’s a small studio apartment, but it’s cozy with touches of home that make Iwaizumi feel welcome immediately. There’s pictures on the walls from childhood to high school. Faces he recognizes: Oikawa’s family who are like Iwaizumi’s, old teammates, and several just of them. On the window is the cactus he got Oikawa which he had promptly named ‘Iwa-chan,’ and the corners of the room are stuffed with icons of their shared sport: shoes, clothes, magazines. Iwaizumi throws down his duffel next to a volleyball and collapses onto the bed. Seconds later Oikawa jumps onto his back and lays there. “Get off of me you fat fuck,” he groans. 

“Nope!” Oikawa chirps as he snakes his arms around Iwaizumi’s torso. “I missed you too much! I’ve gotta make up for lost time.”

“By being a leech?”

“Yep!”

Although Oikawa is far from fat, he is nearly 160lbs of muscle. Iwaizumi tries to roll him off with some difficulty, which Oikawa seems to take as a challenge because less than a minute later they're in a wrestling match punctuated by shouts and grunts. Iwaizumi manages to wrangle Oikawa face down and pins his arms out to either side. “I give up!” Oikawa yells, voice muffled by the sheets. 

“You have to buy me lunch,” Iwaizumi declares as the winner, though he doesn’t relinquish his hold just yet. He shifts his weight down so he’s closer to Oikawa’s ear. “Say yes and I’ll let you go.” 

Oikawa stiffens up, Iwaizumi can feel it as closely twined as they are. He is all too aware of their position in that moment: Oikawa facedown, hands pinned under Iwaizumi’s, the way he is all but laying across Oikawa’s back, groin pressed into his ass. They’ve done this a hundred times before, but this time, to Iwaizumi’s confusion, he grows flustered. The moment Oikawa grumbles something that could be agreement, Iwaizumi scrambles off of him and preoccupies himself by pulling out his phone. He can feel his face warming- what the hell? Is this what it feels like to be apart? Awkward when it shouldn’t be?

“You haven’t changed at all, you brute,” Oikawa complains, bumping his shoulder. “I was gonna buy your lunch anyway since you’re my guest!” 

“Don’t lie,” he snorts. His racing heart is finally slowing after the impromptu fight, so he swipes over to his contacts. “Um. We, we have to call our parents real fast. I said we would once I got here.”

“Oh! Put it on speaker!” Oikawa orders as he reaches around Iwaizumi to jam the speaker button. 

It only rings once before it picks up. “Hajime! Did you make it okay?” his mother asks without preamble. 

“Yeah, I made it fine.”

“Hi, Iwaizumi-san!” 

“Oh, Tōru! It’s so good to hear your voice! Hold on, hold on, let me go get your mom. We’ll call you right back!”

She clicks the line closed and Iwaizumi smiles fondly at his phone. Their households are only a five minute walk down the block from each other, part of how they’d grown to be inseparable. “It’s weird you live so far now,” he blurts, unfiltered. 

Oikawa must have been thinking the same because he sighs, “Yeah. I miss just being five minutes away.”

“Are you lonely?” 

The bed creaks as Oikawa moves to sit at the edge next to Iwaizumi. Between his new classmates and teammates, there’s no chance for someone as charismatic as Oikawa to be lonely. It’s a silly question, but their thighs press together as Oikawa leans into him and sighs, “I just really missed you.”

Iwaizumi finds that he doesn’t want to move away from the comforting weight against him. All this sentimentality, he thinks. He slips an arm around Oikawa’s back and, to his surprise, Oikawa doesn’t tease him. “Yeah. I did too,” he murmurs.

Then his phone rings and he starts a little before he rushes to answer. “Oh, they want to video call.”

“Yay! Let me hold the phone, my arms are longer,” Oikawa exclaims, wresting it from Iwaizumi’s hands. He swipes to accept the call except Iwaizumi realizes the moment their moms’ beaming faces appear on screen that he still has an arm around Oikawa’s waist and he freezes. 

“Oh! Look look, Fumi!” Oikawa-san screams. “There they are!”

“Hi mom! Hi Iwaizumi-san,” Tōru grins. He jostles Hajime, who blinks from his panicked stupor to repeat, “Hi, Oikawa-san.”

“Hajime, I was telling your mom how grateful I am that you’re there with Tōru on your first holiday away from home,” Tōru’s mother, Kaoru says. Tōru is a faithful replica of her: they share the same pretty eyes and smile, though Tōru’s hair is a couple of shades lighter which he must get from his father (neither of them would know). 

“He’s been moping around the house since you left for Tokyo,” Hajime’s mom informs. 

Tōru squeals and Hajime colors. “Mom!” he groans. 

“Don’t worry I’m gonna make him sick of me in this twenty-four hour period,” Tōru assures, pressing his cheek into Hajime’s temple. “When you get him back there won’t be anymore moping.”

Both their moms giggle, Hajime pouts and Tōru throws an arm across his shoulders and starts chattering about his week. Hajime finds himself relaxing against the taller man’s side, despite that their moms are watching. “So, what are you boys going to do today?” Fumi asks when Tōru’s five minute recap is finished. 

“We’re going to get lunch and then I’ll show Iwa-chan around the school and we’ll go to the gym,” Tōru rattles off. 

“The gym?” Kaoru questions. “Why don’t you take Hajime around the city? Take him to see the sights!”

Hajime clears his throat. “I don’t need all that, Oikawa-san,” he mumbles. “We’re just going to play a little volleyball again. The usual stuff. That’s what he wanted.” 

His mom snorts and Kaoru chides, “Hajime. You can’t let Tōru get away with so much. If you give him an inch, he’ll take a mile. Make sure you do what you want too!” 

“Iwa-chan doesn’t let me get away with anything ever,” Tōru complains in response. “What he’s not saying is that he wanted to play volleyball just as much as I do!” 

“Shut up, Mouthykawa,” Hajime says with an eye roll. “You’re the one who suggested the gym.” 

“Well you agreed right away!” 

“Boys! We won’t take up your time,” Fumi interrupts in a firm voice though she looks like she’s repressing a smile. 

“Right, I have to go to work soon anyway,” Kaoru adds. “Without my baby in the nest I can pick up extra shifts at the hospital.”

Hajime squeezes his fingers into Tōru’s ribs- the ones wrapped around his waist- and Tōru squeaks. “Baby,” he whispers. It’s supposed to be mocking, except that Tōru ducks his head and mumbles something unintelligible. 

“Don’t tease Tōru,” Iwaizumi-san scolds. 

“Well which is it! Don’t tease him or don’t give him an inch?” Hajime scowls. 

Their moms laugh again and when Tōru lifts his face, Hajime can see in the front-facing camera that his cheeks are pink. “Well,” Tōru declares with an air of haughtiness that is very much like him, “if everyone’s all done, we are going to go get lunch!”

“Okay baby,” Kaoru says. “You boys have a good day. Thank you again Hajime!”

“Of course Oikawa-san. Bye mom,” Hajime says. 

“Bye sweetie!” 

The image freezes then disappears as the women hang up. “Sweetie,” Tōru mocks, squeezing Hajime’s cheeks. 

“Baby,” he shoots back as he tugs Tōru’s hands away from his face. Tōru narrows his raw honey eyes, and Hajime could count all of his ridiculously long dark eyelashes if he wanted. Have they really always been like that and he just never noticed? Tōru’s eyes are just really, really pretty. They’ve fallen silent; Hajime is still holding his hands. The air between them feels… different. It has a _feeling._

Tōru’s cheeks are flushed again, and his lips twitch. He pulls his slender hands free and smiles, “So. I’m supposed to buy your lunch. Are you hungry?”

***

They eat lunch at a place near the campus which is only two train stops from Oikawa’s university. They could have walked but they cram together in the train instead, Iwaizumi jostling against his chest with the periodic sway of the train. Oikawa drags him around the campus talking about sports management and his prestigious teachers and the alumni and whatever else comes to mind. Iwaizumi doesn’t even tell him to shut up even though he normally would have by now. 

It’s the mid afternoon before they make it to the gym that Oikawa has reserved for a two hour block weeks ago when Iwaizumi got the train ticket. He’s been lugging around a bag with his shoes and a pair of sweats the whole day but walking into the gym makes it worth the minor annoyance. Oikawa skips out of the locker room ahead of Iwaizumi and bee lines for the ball cart. 

“Hey!” Iwaizumi shouts as he pops into the gym and sees Oikawa gearing up for a serve. “You haven’t even stretched! Don’t be stupid!”

“Iwa-chan,” he whines, coming to a stop before his run up is finished. “That just wastes time.” 

Iwaizumi jogs up to him wearing a frown and drags Oikawa by the back of the shirt away from the cart. “You’ll be wasting more time when you get injured because you didn’t warm up properly. You go to this fancy school. I know they teach you about freaking stretching. Come on.” He puts his hand between Oikawa’s shoulder blades and coaxes him into bending. 

“Such a brute,” Oikawa mutters. He reaches for his ankles and shoots a weary gaze up through his long lashes at Iwaizumi. 

His mouth goes dry when he looks at Oikawa bent in half over one leg. His long, muscular leg, beneath regulation shorts that seem suddenly far too short. Legs which lead into an ass perfectly rounded by exercise and—

And, wow, Iwaizumi is ogling his best friend. Who is giving him a strange look. The air between them has a feeling again,tense and heavy with- _something_. 

“You don’t have to watch me to make sure I do it,” Oikawa says, switching legs. Iwaizumi averts his eyes and drops into a stretch of his own so he can catch his breath. 

Iwaizumi repeats the words of Kaoru, “Can’t give you an inch,” and Oikawa chuckles. 

“It’s true. You really shouldn’t,” he agrees. Iwaizumi doesn’t have to be looking at his face to hear the grin in his voice, but something about it sounds like a warning. He shivers.

They finish ten more minutes of stretching before Oikawa is too pent up to be restrained any longer. It’s the most fun Iwaizumi has had since they left high school volleyball behind for different cities and busy schedules. They serve at each other and try a hectic one on one match that ends with them laughing. Oikawa sets for him and Iwaizumi slams set after perfect set across the net. His heart is pounding from exertion and exhilaration. He wishes this could be everyday. 

“Me too,” Oikawa answers, and Iwaizumi chokes when he realizes he’s spoken aloud. He hides his face in his shirt under the guise of wiping sweat. 

“Excuse me,” a voice calls from the door. They turn to see the gym’s student attendant, clipboard in her hand. “You only have fifteen minutes left on your reservation time. You’ll just need to pack up the balls and we’ll handle the rest.”

Oikawa flashes a dazzling smile and a thumbs up. When she’s gone, he pouts, “That went way too fast.”

“Yeah it did,” Iwaizumi frowns. He lets his eyes linger on Oikawa, who is stretching out his arms overhead and sighing. The move bares a sliver of his stomach along the bottom of his untucked shirt, the sharp vee where his abs meet his too-short shorts. “Um, should we, I mean,” he stutters when Oikawa’s intense gaze falls on him and steals the intelligent thought right out of his brain. “The balls,” he supplies, finally. 

A slow smile curves across Oikawa’s features, but with heavy-lidded eyes it only results in a flirty look that sets Iwaizumi’s blood on fire in a way it never has before. He’s seen that look: it practically lives on Oikawa’s face when there’s a cute girl around, maybe once or twice directed towards a guy when he thought Iwaizumi wasn’t looking, but he’s never been on the receiving end. 

Holy shit that was powerful.

“Yes Iwa-chan,” Oikawa agrees. “The balls. Let’s hurry.” It takes only a few minutes to gather the wayward balls strewn about, and Oikawa wheels the cart towards the back of the gym. He makes for the locker room until, once again, Iwaizumi grabs his arm with a disapproving frown. 

“What are you forgetting?” 

“Iwa-chan—“

“No, we have, like, eight minutes. Stretch,” he ordered.

Oikawa sticks out his tongue so Iwaizumi gives his arm a tug. When he draws closer Iwaizumi’s pulse races even though he knows the look on his face precedes teasing. “Make me,” he dares. Iwaizumi thinks that this feeling between them has a name, but he doesn’t know what he’s actually supposed to do with this knowledge. It flusters him a little. He grabs Oikawa by the collar with his free hand, the other still around his arm, and orders, “Get on the floor.”

Oikawa grins, “Yes _sir_ ,” and sinks onto his back. Iwaizumi doesn’t speak as he follows him to his knees. With practiced ease he takes hold of Oikawa’s leg and raises it slowly until Oikawa grunts. He holds it, counts, then releases. 

“Good?” he asks as he repeats the action. 

Oikawa moans, which does nothing to help Iwaizumi’s heart rate. “S’good,” he affirms. Iwaizumi releases, then leans over to swing the athlete’s knees to one side, a hand on his hip. “This is better,” Oikawa sighs. 

“You’re tight because you aren’t stretching enough,” Iwaizumi retorts. 

Oikawa hums and switches sides. “Hmm, I’m sorry,” he simpers. 

“No you aren’t.” Iwaizumi lets him go, then pushes his knees to his chest, deeper than is strictly necessary. 

“Jesus, you’re still a brute,” Oikawa pants. 

Iwaizumi scoffs and holds the stretch a few extra seconds before he releases Oikawa’s leg. “You need to be doing these stretches and more before and after and you know it,” he chastises. “I know your physical therapist has told you this a million times, so do it properly, Lazykawa.”

“I like it when you do for me,” Oikawa teases with a cheeky smile. He hasn’t moved from his back. “You should come be my personal trainer.”

“Hah, I only just got rid of you,” Iwaizumi snorts, throwing a water bottle at the prone man. “Come on, we’ve only got a couple more minutes.”

Oikawa emits an indignant squeak as the bottle rebounds off of his stomach. He sits up and pouts, “Don’t pretend like you didn’t miss me.”

Iwaizumi holds back a smile that threatens to work his way into his lips. “Just because I do doesn’t mean I’m going to pack up and come here just to babysit you.” Before Oikawa can reply, Iwaizumi picks up his leg and pulls it into his lap so the finicky knee is in hand. He tugs the soft brace down to his ankle and starts rubbing gentle lines into Oikawa’s skin. “You should be able to take care of yourself without me,” he says, eyes trained on his hands. Oikawa goes slack under Iwaizumi’s ministrations. It’s back, that odd tension in the air, that thick but not unpleasant feeling. Iwaizumi can feel the other man’s gaze on him, and it leaves a prickle on his skin. 

“I can, but I like it when you take care of me,” Oikawa repeats, this time without the cheeky smile. Something about his tone, soft but unhesitating, sets Iwaizumi’s stomach fluttering. His hands still, wrapped around Oikawa’s leg. There is a look in Oikawa’s eyes, like he’s studying him; he wonders what Oikawa thinks when he sees him. “It feels good when you do it,” Oikawa adds. 

Iwaizumi is overly conscious then of how smooth Oikawa’s skin is as the muscles of his thigh tense under his fingers. From the perspective of a trainer and athlete, he has always admired Oikawa’s form, muscular, lean and tall. He’s never thought about the man himself being beautiful independent of that, and it seems silly suddenly that he hadn’t. The form he so admired, once under his fingers, is stunning: the strength, his soft, unblemished skin, a regal, sharp face. From head to toe, Iwaizumi realizes, Oikawa Tōru is a beautiful man. 

The urge to chase that beauty beyond where it disappears under his clothes is overwhelming in its abrupt insistence. It rattles around in his skull with Oikawa’s words, _‘It feels good when you do it_ ,’ electrifies his insides. Iwaizumi knows what it means, this wild urge he hasn’t even felt for his own girlfriend. With a hard swallow he averts his gaze and moves Oikawa’s leg from his lap. “We should change and go home,” he says, though his voice seems shaky to his own ears. 

Oikawa stares at him a moment longer with his curious, narrowed eyes. The atmosphere between them still feels thick when he draws his legs under him and sighs, “Yeah, before it starts getting too late.” They stand, gather their water, and Oikawa places a hand on the small of Iwaizumi’s back as he guides him towards the locker room. 

Iwaizumi doesn’t say anything about the action. Like a magnet he drifts a little closer until, by the time they reach the locker room, Oikawa’s fingers are almost entirely curled around his waist. Oikawa doesn’t say anything about that either. He’s taken this for granted, Iwaizumi thinks. They’d always been together, so the glancing touches, nights spent together, and Oikawa blossoming into someone as attractive as everyone else said he was, had passed him by. Iwaizumi places his own hand on Oikawa’s back, unwilling to let him go. Why should he when he’s only just realized there’s a part of Oikawa he doesn’t know yet? 

His hand stays fisted in the back of Oikawa’s sweaty shirt even as they stop in front of the locker in which their belongings are stowed. Oikawa shoots him another appraising look as he loosens his grip on Iwaizumi to face him more fully. There’s a beat of anticipatory quiet.

“I’m not imagining this, right?” Oikawa prompts with his chin high and eyes revealing his anxiousness. 

Iwaizumi could always let go of Oikawa’s shirt and say yes. He would say yes and maybe give him a playful shove and call him crazy and things would go back to normal. He would go back home- to his new girlfriend- and not have broached some strange new boundary with his best friend. That would be smart, decent, and safe. 

He guesses Oikawa has always known what he was talking about when he called him a brute: Iwaizumi doesn’t want to listen to reason. 

“You’re not,” he says back, a challenge. He is caught off-guard by the fire that sparks alive in the depths of Oikawa’s eyes at his admission. It is the look of a conqueror. Then Oikawa closes the last few inches between them and kisses him. 

It isn’t as though he has ever thought about the occurrence before today, and so Hajime isn’t exactly sure how he is supposed to react to a kiss from his best friend. The lag between his brain and body is probably what allows the instinctual reaction to wrap his arms around the other man’s waist. A moment later a breathless Oikawa pulls away and Hajime gasps, “Oh.”

‘Oh,’ probably isn’t what Oikawa is expecting either. He hovers over Iwaizumi with lips parted in surprise, though surprise belongs to Iwaizumi when he realizes that he wants Oikawa’s lips back on him. Maybe it is something written in his face, or maybe Oikawa just knows him that well. Either way Iwaizumi receives his unspoken wish when Oikawa mashes their lips back together with a breathy groan. Whatever hope Iwaizumi’s brain had of catching up to the turn of events is gone to some far off place with other things Hajime should probably be thinking of but isn’t (eg: Ayane, or the fact that they’re in a semi-public locker room). 

His back hits the lockers with a metallic rattle he doesn’t hear over the tiny whine that Tōru- oh, no, _he’s_ the one making that noise. It draws a feral growl from Tōru in response and his tongue pushes between Hajime’s lips. The needy whine that is indeed coming from Iwaizumi’s throat grows more insistent and his hands find purchase in the small of Tōru’s back. Tōru grinds into him as if they aren’t close enough, but Hajime must agree since he's pulling the other man with the same ferocity. Air that should be present is evaporated from Hajime’s lungs by the fire of Oikawa’s mouth. His knees grow weak with the effort of trying to stand and catch his ragged breath. In an abrupt, desperate bid to save his own life, Hajime rips his face away and gasps into the cool air. 

“Oikawa,” he rasps in a voice that isn’t even his. He hadn’t even sounded so ruined that night they lost their last chance to Nationals. 

Oikawa is curled over him with his unoccupied inferno of a mouth against Hajime’s ear. The sound of his breath does things to Hajime that he is sure Oikawa can feel given the tight fit of their hips. “Let’s go home, Iwa-chan,” Oikawa purrs. Iwaizumi hears the promise and the threat in his tone: leaving with Oikawa is an agreement to burn himself alive. He should say no. Somewhere in the back of his head, he thinks of a girl’s name. 

Oikawa slips a hand between them and palms Iwaizumi’s erection. He bucks into the touch with a moan that is swallowed by another kiss. “Okay,” Iwaizumi croaks when they separate a moment later. He barely remembers throwing on his sweatpants and jacket before Oikawa is again dragging him by the hand across Tokyo. 

He’s seen Oikawa in a frenzy before- tests, ex-girlfriends, Kageyama Tobio, have all given him the manic expression he currently wears. Iwaizumi has never seen it directed at him though, and it’s a little intimidating to see Oikawa size him up as if he’s something to devour. It’s different but he can’t say he dislikes it. They keep their hands to themselves on the train, but they’re scarcely inside the apartment when Oikawa seals him against the entryway, their hurried pace resuming. 

Iwaizumi locks his hands around Oikawa’s back as their lips slot together, seamless as the two of them have always been. Is that why Hajime doesn’t care to protest this turn of events? Everything about Oikawa is as natural as breathing, even as he is exposed to uncharted territory. His hands want to learn all the parts of Oikawa Tōru still unknown to him. They slip down his back and around Oikawa’s backside, pulling tight to earn a heady groan from the other man at the contact of their hips. His body seems to understand exactly what it wants, and inexperience allows him to follow along in Oikawa’s fearless wake when he adjusts so the evidence of their twin arousals slide together. 

“Tōru,” he pants against the taller man’s lips when Oikawa ruts against him, grinding him into the wall of the apartment. Their shoes are still on and they’re still sweaty from the gym. Neither precludes Oikawa from shoving his hand inside Hajime’s waistband and grasping his erection in hand. A violent shudder wracks Iwaizumi’s frame and he shoves at Oikawa’s shoulders. “Wait,” he growls. 

The feral expression Oikawa wears cools a little. He takes a step back, enough space for Hajime to catch his breath. “Too much?” he asks, tracing a slim finger around Hajime’s ear. 

The gentle gesture stirs as much of a response as the rest. Iwaizumi is lightheaded at the feeling, hyper focused as Oikawa draws his perfectly manicured hand back to his side. “No,” he answers when the absence of touch lets him speak. “I kind of want to take a shower though.”

Oikawa looks taken aback, glances down at their gym clothes, then relaxes with a laugh. Rather than move right away, he leans back into Hajime’s space and kisses him, slow and unassuming. “Together?” he suggests, and Iwaizumi flushes to his ears at the intimate suggestion. Seeing the silent reaction, Tōru’s grin grows. “I want to shower with you, Iwa-chan,” he informs without shame. 

“F-Fine,” Iwaizumi whispers, though it is better than fine and he is already toeing off his sneakers. The second their feet are free he allows Oikawa to herd him into the tiny bathroom. It’s a student’s apartment, so Hajime isn’t sure what he was expecting. It will be an impractically tight squeeze for two athletes but that doesn’t perturb Oikawa. The man hooks his fingers into Hajime’s sweaty hair and drags him in for a kiss. 

“Take off your shirt,” he demands when he pauses to turn on the water. He drags his own shirt overhead and Iwaizumi’s eyes track to the shifting of muscles along his core at the movement. Oikawa catches him staring and the fervent glimmer in his eyes is back. He advances on Iwaizumi a few short steps and clenches the hem of his shirt in hand. “Do you need help?” he asks sweetly. 

“No,” Iwaizumi snaps as he yanks it off in a hurry. It’s already growing humid in the little room. Moisture collects along Oikawa’s hairline; he glows. Iwaizumi pulls Tōru close, digs his thumbs into the space below his hip bones along the low waistband of his shorts and briefs. The other man stills and fixes a wide, expectant gaze on Iwaizumi that he meets. He inches both garments down and down and down and only breaks eye contact when they are loose enough to fall unaided to the floor. “Ah,” he breathes and Oikawa shivers under the intensity of his stare. 

Iwaizumi thought he knew everything about Oikawa Tōru, but beneath his clothes is a stranger about whom he knows nothing, but with whom he would like to become acquainted. His rough hands find first the dip of Oikawa’s waist and travel across his chest. Iwaizumi avoids his ribs: he has always been ticklish. He travels lower, a little shy and hesitant. He’s never touched anyone like this before, but the way Oikawa sucks his lip between his teeth and groans when Iwaizumi’s careless fingers brush down the length of his shaft is enough to give him a touch more confidence. 

Unsurprisingly, Oikawa’s cock is as perfect as the rest of him. Iwaizumi, lips parted and cheeks rosy, encircles him with soft reverence. A few experimental pumps of his hand and Oikawa is holding his forearms in a white-knuckled grip. He likes this, reducing Oikawa to a quivering mess so unlike everything Iwaizumi thought he knew about him. It doesn’t last long, his explorations, before Oikawa pushes at his arms, panting, “Wait!” Grinning, Hajime grasps Oikawa’s face and brings their lips together. 

As with everything Oikawa does, he meets Iwaizumi with enthusiasm bordering on manic. In moments Hajime shivers as he is divested of his remaining clothes by self-sure fingers. Unlike Hajime, who has always been the more reticent of the two, Tōru whispers quiet praise as his fingers explore the peaks and valleys of Hajime’s body. Despite his gruff exterior Hajime finds himself blushing to his ears at unadulterated compliments that vacillate between sweet and lewd. 

Oikawa seems more mindful in his study of Iwaizumi, or maybe he’s trying to tease because he touches him everywhere except his cock, which has been half-hard for what seems like an eternity. Perhaps it’s that loss of blood to his head that makes Iwaizumi carefully follow as Tōru climbs into the shower. Showering together isn’t what movies make it out to be. Someone is always just out of the spray of hot water so they take turns passing the shower head back and forth. It also takes significantly longer to actually shower for the number of times their hands find each other’s bodies. 

Somewhere in the back of his thoughts, Iwaizumi asks himself what he’s doing. Somewhere, he’s wondering how they’ve ended up here after knowing each other for most of their lives. Has he ever thought of Oikawa this way? Has Oikawa? It was too easy to fall into this for both of them. He decides to consider it later because Tōru sinks to his knees in the tiny, cramped shower and kisses the junction of Iwaizumi’s thigh. Iwaizumi’s knees threaten to buckle. His hands slip uselessly against the tile in an attempt to keep himself standing. 

“Oikawa—“ he gasps, but whatever blood has managed to make it to his brain is gone the moment Oikawa’s tongue slides along the length of him. Words fail him. It’s a miracle Iwaizumi manages to stay upright. 

Oikawa says nothing because he can’t, but it doesn’t stop him from moaning a satisfied sort of noise around the full length of Hajime’s cock in his mouth. He moves his head and Hajime is left staring helplessly as the scene unfolds. It’s odd to see Oikawa kneel for anyone: Iwaizumi would've believed his pride too great for an act like this. It's humbling and exhilarating and feels so, _so_ good. 

He wants to bury his hands Oikawa’s hair, wet and slick against his forehead, but Oikawa’s always been particular with his hair. Iwaizumi braces his hands against the slippery wall instead. Unoccupied as they were, Oikawa’s fingers drift lazily along the back of Iwaizumi’s thighs, dig briefly into the swell of his ass, and then further in bit by bit. Iwaizumi throws open his eyes as Oikawa presses questioningly at his entrance, but the surprise is the filthy moan that leaves Iwaizumi’s throat in response. His skin is on fire, whole body screaming in agreement. He slaps a hand over his mouth. 

Oikawa glances up, fingers paused where they are. His lips slide free of Iwaizumi’s cock, though, and Iwaizumi has to look away from the sly grin on his face. “Do you like it when I touch you there?” Tōru rasps. 

Oh, god. He _does_. 

Iwaizumi covers his red face. He can’t answer that question aloud. Does it make him some kind pervert if he says yes? It doesn’t help that Oikawa is wearing that knowing smirk and had to phrase the question in the most explicit way possible. He shouldn’t be allowed so much pleasure from something like that; somehow that thought makes him harder still. He peeks when Oikawa stands with a quick rub to his knee before he takes Iwaizumi’s hands in his. 

“Get on the bed,” Oikawa orders quietly. He’s still wearing that hungry, all-knowing grin, and his amber eyes have gone heavy and focused again. By all counts he should’ve looked ridiculous, wet hair and naked and grinning, but Iwaizumi is so turned on he can’t even argue. Frowning and flushing, he gives a curt nod. 

“I like this side of you,” Oikawa teases as he turns off the shower and begins to towel himself dry. “So compliant.” 

“Shut up,” Iwaizumi hisses. He’s drying himself faster that he would ever admit, practically vibrating from his skin. _What are you doing?_ he demands of himself once more, though it still yields no answers. This is Oikawa, his best friend since age four. Iwaizumi has a girlfriend and he’s being a cheating piece of shit for going along with this. 

But, it isn’t like stopping now will be any less irredeemable than letting Oikawa fuck him. He’s already messed it up- he may as well _really_ mess it up.

He screws his eyes shut when the terrible justification offers itself. He grasps it with everything he has and stomps himself over to Oikawa’s bed. “Hurry up,” he calls back at the bathroom, where Oikawa is probably still squeezing water carefully from his hair. 

“Coming!” he sings. There’s a clatter and when Oikawa emerges from the bathroom he’s holding a bottle of lube and a foil packet. Iwaizumi’s face starts burning all over again. Oikawa is breathtaking in his shamelessness: he saunters to the bed and climbs onto Iwaizumi with the single-minded focus that has always made him attractive. Iwaizumi’s embarrassment dissipates as Oikawa straddles and kisses him. 

Even as he wonders why they’re doing this, Iwaizumi wonders why they haven’t sooner. The way Oikawa feels beneath his hands is like the last piece of a puzzle. How satisfying to think he knows someone and still discover something new. 

“You sure you want to do this?” Oikawa, flushed and out of breath, asks against Iwaizumi’s neck. “I’ll do my best but it’s still gonna hurt a little.” 

The implication that maybe Iwaizumi couldn’t handle it fuels his competitiveness. “I’m not made outta glass, Oikawa,” he gripes. 

A pleased smile lightens the other man’s features, though it fades into something a little less smug. “I want you to enjoy it,” he says, and Iwaizumi has to scowl harder in an effort to keep at bay the soft smile which threatens to overcome him. Not that Oikawa is fooled by that, because he never has been and likely never will be. “Stay like this,” Oikawa adds as he slicks his fingers with a generous squirt of lube. “I want to see your face.” 

Iwaizumi doesn’t have time to question the order: Oikawa leans into him, pushing his knees open, and presses a finger against him. Iwaizumi can’t consider what his face may look like anyway, too fixated on the way it feels as Oikawa penetrates him. It’s weird and wrong and _good._ He stifles a moan but it tumbles from his lips anyway when Oikawa works his way up to the knuckle. He doesn’t recall throwing his hand over his eyes until Oikawa tickles his palm and asks, “Good?”

“Yes,” Iwaizumi gasps. He bites down on his lip as Oikawa eases out of him before repeating. 

“In all my fantasies it’s been the other way around,” Oikawa confesses, pushing into him a little quicker, more fully. “I think I like this better. I don’t think I could’ve imagined the faces you’re making.” 

“Sh-shut up. Can’t stop talking even when you’re—“ Iwaizumi finds himself unable to put words to what they're doing and presses his mouth into a line. 

Oikawa smirks and gives the slightest experimental wiggle of his finger which has Iwaizumi gasping. He scrabbles for the lube, pours more on his hand, then a second finger joins the first. Iwaizumi flinches at the sting but nods quickly so Oikawa slows but doesn’t stop. He is blessedly quiet for a few minutes while Iwaizumi adjusts to the change. It’s faster then, that he relaxes, lets out a soft groan when it changes from weird to good again. 

The tension eases from Tōru too, subtle though it is. Iwaizumi can feel the fluidity return to Tōru’s hand before the grin even returns to his face. “Is that okay? You like it right?” Tōru purrs. 

Hajime narrows his eyes, his bottom lip between his teeth. He knows he looks petulant but he can’t quite bring himself to admit that, yes, he really likes the way it feels with Tōru’s fingers in his ass. Too crude, he just can’t say it. Of course he at least knows Tōru well enough to not have to voice it. 

“I think you like it,” Tōru drawls. It’s unclear if he’s referring to his penchant for being chatty or the actions of his hand. Iwaizumi is pretty sure he actually likes both a lot. “Do you, Iwa-chan? You want more?”

Oh, now Oikawa is just fucking with him because Iwaizumi is completely at his mercy. He shoots a glare at the grinning man that only makes Oikawa draw his fingers free. Iwaizumi, despite himself, lets out a bereft groan. “Use your words,” Oikawa teases.

In any other scenario he would never let Oikawa get away with this level of bullshit. He’s taking his mile. Hajime supposes he is learning just as much about himself as he is Oikawa when he whispers, “Y-Yes.”

Even Oikawa seems a little surprised at Iwaizumi’s admission. Then he recovers, a hungry look on his eager face as he puts more lube on his fingers. The dredges of shame still clinging to Iwaizumi fall away. He moans, head tossed back on the pillow, as Oikawa diligently works him open. 

Never has Iwaizumi dreamed he would be this person, laying open and vulnerable having voluntarily relinquished power into someone else’s hands. He is, though. He’s falling into the rhythm of Oikawa’s fingers and praises like he’s jumped into the ocean a thousand miles from shore. By the time Oikawa adds his lips around Iwaizumi’s cock, he has committed himself enthusiastically to drowning. 

“Oikawa,” he rasps. There’s a desperate tone to his voice he would’ve thought pathetic at any other point but can’t care about now. Oikawa looks up, then untangles himself from Iwaizumi’s legs. 

It’s a small mercy when Oikawa doesn’t tease. An uncharacteristic expression of seriousness crosses his face. “Tell me if you want to stop,” he says. 

“Not happening,” Iwaizumi asserts as he sits up to kiss him. They’ve known each other far too long to worry about second-guessing. Oikawa doesn’t have to ask again. He pushes Iwaizumi away, flat onto his back again and digs the condom out from where it had become hidden in the sheets. Iwaizumi’s heart is pounding in his ears watching Oikawa carefully roll the latex on and line himself up. It’s so hot, the tip of him at his entrance and he shivers- anticipation and desire. 

Everything Oikawa promised is true: he does try to make it painless but it hurts as he slides himself inch by inch inside of Iwaizumi. “Hey, hey, look at me,” Oikawa says. Hajime realizes his eyes have been screwed shut. His vision is swimming when he meets Oikawa’s eyes hovering anxiously above him. “Relax.” 

How exactly is he supposed to relax with half a dick in his ass, he wants to ask, and a weak grin crosses his face at the absurdity of it. Oikawa raises an eyebrow, but the tension that had been pinching at Iwaizumi’s eyes is gone so he capitalizes on the moment instead of asking. They both gasp as Oikawa sinks the last few inches all at once and brings them flush. 

It steals the breath from him all over again when Iwaizumi looks up and meets Oikawa’s hazy, heavy-lidded gaze. His lips are parted, panting, his arms wrapped around Iwaizumi’s thighs shaking. It’s hot and it stings and it’s different and so good. A tear tracks down into Iwaizumi’s temple and he shudders, the little shift enough to draw Oikawa from his daze. He moves his hips away, not by much, but the rejoining draws a moan from Iwaizumi’s lips. “Good?” Oikawa asks again. 

Iwaizumi nods, untrusting of his voice. Another tear sneaks from his eye and disappears into his hair. When Oikawa moves again it’s a little further and another moan falls from them both when he pushes all the way back into Iwaizumi. “K-Keep going,” he finally chokes out, squeezing on to Oikawa’s arms like it’s all that’s between him and drowning, except that Oikawa looks just as adrift as Iwaizumi feels.

“Iwa— ah, feels so good,” Oikawa moans with a gentle snap of his hips. With the weight of his body guiding the angle of their hips, he drops his hands around Iwaizumi’s face to form an intimate cage. Like this, the silly nickname adopted years and years ago sounds almost sweet falling from his lips. “Iwa-chan, you feel so _good_ ,” he gasps, thumbing clumsily at the wet line across Iwaizumi’s temple. Oikawa talks. Oikawa talks and Iwaizumi tells him to shut up when he’s talked too much. It’s what he does, but Iwaizumi wasn’t ready for how much he likes listening to him talk in the heat of the moment. “You like it? Like the way I feel inside you?” Oikawa asks. 

“F-Fuck, Tōru, yes,” he whines before he can even think to be embarrassed. Iwaizumi isn’t the one who talks, but it’s the right thing to say. Tōru smiles, a wide, feral thing, strains down to press a sloppy kiss to his lips. It’s so good, the heat of Oikawa’s cock leaving and filling him over and over as they figure out a rhythm. They’ve been in sync on the court their whole lives, so Iwaizumi thinks it’s no surprise they sync up in this way. He doesn’t recognize himself, though, the guttural cries coming from his lips or the eagerness in his body as he meets Oikawa stroke for stroke. 

“Hajime,” Tōru pants with his wicked smile, “can you t… touch yourself?” 

He doesn’t know why that- of all the things occurring- is what makes him blush, but Hajime’s face warms. He drops his eyes to the side as he drops a hand between their stomachs to encircle his cock, hard and leaking against him. “Like that, yeah,” Tōru urges as he pauses to sit back and watch, then readjust, hands to the backs of Iwaizumi’s thighs. 

“Oh, fuck,” Iwaizumi groans, the shyness of a moment prior falling away at the depth Oikawa reaches when he thrusts back into him. “Like that, Tōru, don’t stop—“ 

“Keep talking like that, I’m not gonna last another minute,” Oikawa growls even as he makes no move to slow. The brief clarity his face held is gone. His honey eyes are unfocused even as he stares at Iwaizumi, sweat trailing lines down his neck. His arms are trembling where they pin Iwaizumi open.

“S’okay,” Iwaizumi offers, not that he’s fully cognizant of words or thought or anything that isn’t Oikawa’s cock. He fists a handful of the sheets in one hand and works at himself with the other, eyes following the trail of sweat down Oikawa’s chest. “Just keep, keep g-going—“ Oikawa can’t even manage his snarky smile anymore; he drowning in the best way. Long eyelashes flutter against his cheeks, splotchy pink and Iwaizumi can’t believe he looks so good when he looks so wrecked. There’s no more holding on for Oikawa, Iwaizumi can see it, feel it, the change in his stuttering hips. “H-Hajime— I, I,” he gasps and Iwaizumi nods furiously, moans, “Yes, yes—“

Tōru collapses around him with one last thrust of his hips, cums grasping Hajime’s face in his hands and spilling his name from his lips. There’s a moment it feels like they’re irrevocably connected: Hajime breathes in Tōru’s air as he shudders and gasps, their bodies flush and lips sliding together and apart. “Tōru,” he breathes, hands clinging to Tōru’s back. Tōru giggles a little, finally opening glossy eyes. 

“Holy shit,” Tōru swears. He presses another kiss to Hajime’s lips, to his cheek and forehead and he smiles throughout it all. “I don’t ever want to move,” he babbles. “I want to stay like this. I wanna do it again. I want you again.”

Iwaizumi groans in embarrassment but Tōru’s fingers wrap around his chin and he can’t hide his face that way. “You want me too, right?” Oikawa asks, searching his red face for any hint of a lie because only he would know if Iwaizumi was lying. 

He isn’t though, when he answers, “Yes.” Before Oikawa can get too carried away though, Iwaizumi pragmatically adds, “Maybe not at this exact moment because I think you probably have to get off of me so I can take a shower.” 

Chuckling, Tōru lets his forehead fall against Hajime’s, who gasps at the sudden loss when Tōru adjusts his hips and slips his cock the rest of the way out of him. He throws his head against the pillow, runs his hands over his chest and exhales his surprise while Tōru ties off the condom. He’s not sure what he should be feeling: maybe regret or shame, but he doesn’t. He’s sticky and sore and _weird_ but he wants to pull Tōru against his chest and lay in bed together. With a groan he sits up and Oikawa is back in front of him, pushing him back onto the pillow. “What are you—?”

Uncharacteristically, Tōru doesn’t say anything, he just climbs between his knees and takes Hajime’s dick into his mouth. “Oh my god,” he chokes. He digs his fingers into the bed but Tōru grabs blindly at his wrist and moves it to the back of his head instead. He doesn’t complain, rifles his fingers through the damp silky strands that he’s never touched seriously before. All that talking Oikawa does, Iwaizumi wonders if that’s what has made him so good at this. His tongue flat against his cock, lips tightening around him, it’s enough to make Iwaizumi twitch. He drives his hips upward; Tōru pushes him back into the mattress. 

There’s wordless praise bubbling in his throat, followed by Tōru’s name. He watches, squeezes back the stars in his eyes as Tōru’s head bobs up and down and drags Iwaizumi to the edge faster than he can breathe. “I-I, Tōru, I’m so—“ and Tōru blinks up through his long eyelashes. He hums an affirmation that makes Iwaizumi gasp and doesn’t slow, doesn’t stop until Iwaizumi is chasing his release over the edge. With his hands fisted in Tōru’s hair, Iwaizumi manages a ragged cry and cums hard and hot down Tōru’s throat. He can’t catch his breath, is still seeing stars as Tōru laps the last drops from his cock with a lewd slurp. He can’t even pretend to respond to the teasing grin that overtakes Tōru’s face when he rises. 

“Oh my god,” Iwaizumi gasps again. 

“Now you can come take a shower,” Tōru declares. “Though I’d recommend not standing up too fast. Come on.” 

This time he lets Tōru slowly pull him upright. Already that needy heat is back in the other man’s eyes and Iwaizumi wonders if he’s ready for what he seems to have signed up for. He especially wonders as Tōru’s hand lingers along the small of his back and slides downward for a brief moment when they reach the threshold to the bathroom. “I’ll change the sheets,” Tōru sings, leaving Iwaizumi with a kiss and shutting the door behind him. 

Iwaizumi gives his reflection a stunned once over. He mechanically turns the shower back on. 

That actually happened. 

He and Tōru had sex. 

Iwaizumi had cheated on his girlfriend and gave his virginity to his childhood friend. 

He scrubs at his face like it’ll scrub the goofy grin off of it. 

He should feel regret or shame or embarrassment, he thinks, but he doesn’t which does make him feel a little guilty. He’s nervous and excited and he really wants to see what limits Tōru is planning to push. He steps into the hot water, hisses when it hits his backside, and starts to scrub. When he finishes, Tōru calls, “Come back to bed.” 

Hajime lets out a steadying exhale to try and get his smile under control. When he comes back to the room, they trade places with a fluttery kiss. Hajime slides between the fresh sheets, but his grin disappears when his phone rings. 

***

“I’m gonna miss you,” Tōru whispers on the train platform. They’ve said goodbye with a kiss and more at the apartment, but Hajime still clings to him, his face in Tōru’s neck. This whole trip, he’s been so sentimental. His throat is tight. 

“I’ll miss you too,” Hajime answers. It’s weird how much more final this feels than when Tōru first moved to Tokyo. He really doesn’t want to go, but the train voice is calling for boarding and he really has to. 

It’s a little embarrassing that Tōru is the one who pushes him away and gestures towards the train. “I’ll text you, Iwa-chan,” he assures. “Get on the train and tell Mom I said hi when you get back, okay?”

“Okay,” Hajime nods, shouldering his bag. Heaving an annoyed sigh he turns before he can change his mind and hurries onto the train. He’s barely sat when his phone pings. 

_Miss you already_

_(ʃƪ ˘ ³˘)_

Hajime laughs. 

  
  
  


_I miss you too_

_Dumbass_

***

Iwaizumi stumbles as Ayane throws her arms around his waist. “It’s good to see you!” she chirps, looking up at him with a grin. She fits under his shoulder but she’s stronger than most people would expect being a soccer player. She flips her brown ponytail over her shoulder as she straightens. “Did you have fun with Oikawa?” 

“Oh yeah!” he squeaks, like the evidence of his infidelity will be readily apparent. It’s not, but he also hadn’t expected her to come over when he’d texted that he’d made it back to town and was going to the library. He’s not sure why because that is the exact thing a good girlfriend would do. Not that he’d know since he’s a piece of shit boyfriend. 

She laughs, “Well what did you do in Tokyo? Surely you didn’t just play volleyball?” She directs him to sit back down at the desk and sits next to him. Her knee bounces against his and he swallows hard. 

“No, no that’s pretty much all we did,” Iwaizumi lies with a shake of his head. “We’ve missed playing. Together. You know, since we used to play together.”

Ayane flashes him a strange look and a strained laugh leaves her. “Well, yeah. You told me. I just figured since you went all the way up to Tokyo for a night you would’ve done more.”

“Sorry we- I’m boring,” he makes himself joke. “Just volleyball and sleep.” _And a lot of sex, literally while you were on the phone._ He bites his lip to keep from saying that last part. 

Her smile becomes more relaxed and she lets her hands come to rest on his arm. To his surprise she leans in and presses a kiss to his lips, then sits back with a cheeky look. “You’re not boring, Iwaizumi,” she informs. “You’re very dedicated and that’s attractive.”

“Uh,” he replies. His face must be the color of a tomato right now. 

She giggles and stands. “I’m going to go get you a coffee. Maybe later, when you’re done studying, you can… come over to my apartment?” There’s a beautiful pink high on her cheeks but her gaze is confident and flirty. 

“S-Sure?” he answers even if it comes out as more of a question. He’s seen that look a lot in the last twenty-four hours but his stomach doesn’t flip and she’s already given him an ecstatic nod and turned to leave with a skip. It takes a minute of staring at his A&P book to realize he’s just agreed to go to Ayane’s apartment. 

His phone buzzes and he is relieved to swipe it open. 

_Our game starts soon_

_Are you still at the library?_

_Yeah_

_Excited? Scouts?_

_Oh, you know me_

_I’m gonna be great_

_I’m gonna win everything and look awesome and go to the Olympics just you wait!_

_(⌬̀⌄⌬́)_

_So_

_Have you seen your girlfriend?_

_Just curious!_

_I know you will_

_She came to the library_

_I didn’t expect it_

_Haha!_

_I bet you’re freaking out_

Iwaizumi drops his forehead to the table and sighs. He is freaking out. That’s exactly what he’s doing. Is he supposed to do something different? When he was with Tōru in Tokyo, everything was clear and good and now he is in Miyagi and a cheater and freaking out. They didn’t talk about what that trip meant because he kept letting Tōru distract him. His phone buzzes again.

_I didn’t mean to laugh_

_It’s not funny_

_Idk why I said haha_

_I’m sorry_

_I mean I’m not sorry for_

_What happened_

_Umm ヾ(｡﹏｡)ﾉﾞ_

_Just sorry we didn’t get to talk about it_

_You do whatever you feel like you have to!_

It’s enough to make Hajime laugh which earns him a dirty look from the library employee shelving books two aisles away. That sure feeling returns just a little, enough to calm his racing heart. This was Tōru he was talking about. It didn’t have to be weird about it. He just needed to accept it and move on. 

_Thanks_

_I don’t regret it either_

_You better stretch Tōru_

_I’ll kill you if you hurt yourself_

_(╬ Ò ‸ Ó)_

_I will stretch!_

_But if I don’t I expect you to come up here and make me_

Iwaizumi’s stomach flips and he grins at his phone like an idiot. 

_I will_

“What’s so funny?” Ayane asks as she sneaks back up on him, coffee in hand. 

He flips his phone over and off and blurts, “Just something Oikawa said.”


	2. Part Two

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sex, panic, repression.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> TW for a panic attack: 
> 
> Starting at “Shut the fuck up...”  
> Ending at “The tinny noise...”
> 
> Idk about y’all but I had a hardcore religious upbringing that caused hardcore identity problems I’m still struggling with. Self-prejudice because of orientation is one. OR ALTERNATIVELY, I’m a repression expert!

Time passes surprisingly fast when it’s being measured in assignment due dates and tests and sporting events. Somehow four more weeks have gone by and Iwaizumi hasn’t figured out what he’s doing with his relationship with Ayane and his _thing_ with Oikawa. He has placed it on the backburner because research papers aren’t going to write themselves, but he still has a girlfriend and he still has Oikawa and if he thinks about it too hard, he gets anxious. Oikawa isn’t pressing him about it and Ayane, of course, doesn’t know. 

He should probably do the proper thing and set some kind of boundaries with Oikawa. It’s just… easier to let himself be distracted. Easier and _fun_ , which he’s sure makes him even sleazier than he already is for cheating. 

Oikawa is completely under his skin, though, because even from a distance, Iwaizumi is cheating on his girlfriend. 

“A bunch of people from my classes want to go to a club this weekend,” Iwaizumi grouses to the phone as he doodles on a notebook. It’s late on a school night, but he and Oikawa have stayed up talking every night without fail since he got back from Tokyo. He’s laying in bed, headphones in so he doesn’t bother his parents, though they're already asleep on the other side of the house. “I can’t get out of it because Ayane said it’s her friend’s birthday.” 

As he does anytime Iwaizumi mentions his girlfriend, Oikawa ignores that portion of his statement to laugh, “Iwa-chan at the club? Oh my god, I wish I could be there! You know you’ll have to dance right? Hey, give me one of your friends’ numbers so I can pay them to take a video for me.” 

Iwaizumi has to bite back a smile so he can sound serious when he says, “Fuck you. I’m not dancing.” 

“I bet if you get drunk you’ll be in the mood to dance,” Oikawa snickers. “Unrelated, ask me what I want for Christmas!” 

“If you say a video of me dancing, I swear to god—“

“Pft- video s’not good enough for Christmas!” Oikawa howls. “I want to go dancing with you! It’s my Christmas wish! Don’t say no.”

“So you can blackmail me for the rest of my life?” Iwaizumi retorts. “I’d rather kill myself.”

“Boo, Iwa-chan! I’ve never gotten to see you dance and I’ve known you forever. It’s not fair!” he complains. 

A thought crosses Iwaizumi’s mind: he imagines dancing with Oikawa. It’s a nice image, Oikawa grinding against him, draped against his chest or with his ass against his hips. Iwaizumi purses his lips as the vision plays out. This could be a boundary issue, easily. He shouldn’t say anything, but he drops his voice and murmurs, “If you never bring it up again maybe I’ll dance with you. In private. But you don’t get anything else from me for Christmas.”

“So how are your classes going?” Oikawa asks immediately.

Iwaizumi can’t help but chuckle, “Really?”

“Nope, nuh uh. You won’t trick me in talking about it and losing my chance,” Oikawa declares. 

“It’s not a trick, I’m really asking!”

For a moment it’s quiet on the other end, save for Oikawa’s soft breathing. Then, “If you let me dance with you,” Oikawa says, breaking the silence, “it’ll be like we’re together.” 

Iwaizumi feels his breath hitch at the admission but doesn’t hear it over the buzz of his heart in his ears. He’s not sure how to reply, and he’s not sure why his heart aches so badly. ‘Together’ is more than their physical proximity and it’s more than just sex, but Iwaizumi isn’t ready to think about what it means. Acting, even impulsively, is fine, but he doesn’t want to actually think about it. He catches his breath and exhales, “We’ll see what happens when you’re here for Christmas break.” 

He can hear the smile in Oikawa’s voice even though all he does is breathe. “Then I won’t bring it up again,” Oikawa says primly. “What else do you want to do while I’m home?”

“Oh, I think my mom mentioned having you all over for dinner one night,” Iwaizumi offers. “And we could catch up with Matsukawa. He mentioned seeing you.” 

“No way! When we left for Tokyo that bastard told me he didn’t want to see me or Makki unless it was for work,” Oikawa gripes. Iwaizumi bursts into laughter which earns an indignant noise from Oikawa. “It’s not right to wish me dead!” he shouts, which only makes Iwaizumi laugh harder. 

“Come on, you know he doesn’t mean it,” Iwaizumi soothes. 

“It’s Mattsun. You can’t know for sure!” Oikawa argues, but his facade is cracking along with his voice by the time he’s done talking. Around his repressed giggles, he concedes, “Fine, I’ll text him! We can get lunch or something.” They spend some time talking about their friends' weird lives: how Matsukawa jumped into a gig picking up bodies for a funeral home and Hanamaki being too lackadaisical about school and part-time jobs. “5000 yen says Makki drops out so he can work,” Oikawa bets. 

Iwaizumi hums his hesitation- the odds aren’t in his favor if he bets against- but he eventually agrees. “It’s too bad he won’t be able to come too,” he says. 

“Yeah, but at least he’s working. I was scared he was going to ask to move in with me if he didn’t get this most recent job,” Oikawa snickers. 

Iwaizumi frowns to himself at the idea of Hanamaki sharing space with Oikawa. Not that he’s _jealous_ of someone living with the other man when he can’t. It’s just that the logistics don’t make sense for such a small apartment. “You’d be stepping all over each other,” he says. 

“Oh yeah. Living with anyone that isn’t you would drive me insane,” Oikawa laughs. 

Iwaizumi isn’t jealous but the tension that had built in his shoulders relaxes its hold. “ _I_ would go crazy trying to live in that shoebox with you.” 

Oikawa hums, thinking, then offers, “We would get a bigger place and split the rent. I’d get a part time job.”

“No way. It’d be easier for me to get a part time job,” he counters. “I don’t have collegiate games to worry about on top of schoolwork.” 

“Then I’ll cook and clean.” 

“You can clean but I don’t want to die from food poisoning. I’ll cook.” 

With a low chuckle, Oikawa replies, “Are you volunteering to be my house husband, Iwa-chan?”

He gives a sharp glance at the door, a pointless gesture since he has headphones in. “Don’t be stupid,” he grumbles. 

“But it sounds like you want to take care of me,” Oikawa teases. “I wouldn’t mind having a hot sugar daddy who does all my cooking and pays for the apartment.” 

“H-Half the apartment!” Iwaizumi stammers. “I mean, I’m not—“ He realizes his voice has gone a little shrill and he coughs. “I wouldn’t be your ‘sugar daddy,’ you pervert,” he finishes in an annoyed whisper. 

It’s too late though, and Oikawa has latched on. He smirks, “Don’t worry, I’ll make it up to you as your hot trophy boyfriend. You can have me whenever you want.” 

Iwaizumi stammers something unintelligible and Oikawa laughs. “Don’t joke like that,” Iwaizumi growls. “It’s not fair.” 

The other man’s laughter dies down and there’s no trace of humor in his tone when he replies, “It doesn’t have to be a joke. If we lived together, we could fuck whenever you wanted.” 

Heat pools in his stomach, a shot of electricity straight through his core. There’s no trace of hesitation when he pictures the scenario with startling clarity. “Y-You, you don’t mean that,” he whispers, though his words sound unconvincing even to himself. 

A dark chuckle sounds in his ear, so breathy Iwaizumi can almost feel it. “I could show you how much I mean it if you want.” 

“What do you mean show me?” Iwaizumi blurts.

“Well, I could tell you that talking about getting to have sex with you again is making me hard,” Oikawa breathes. Over the sound of his pulse in his ears, Iwaizumi hears something like the shuffle of cloth. “Or we could video chat and I could show you.” 

“H-Hold on, let me lock my door,” he gasps. 

“Do you not want me to start without you? It’s a little late for that. I already took off my pants,” Oikawa teases. 

Cursing under his breath, Iwaizumi lurches to his feet and tiptoes across his room while Oikawa continues in his ear, “If you were here, I would have made you watch as I stripped. I’d make you keep your hands to yourself while I pulled my pants off right in front of you. You like my legs, don’t you, Iwa-chan? I noticed you staring at them when we were stretching. When I was bent over in front of you. You’re so bad. You were already thinking of touching me then, weren’t you?” 

Iwaizumi scrambles around his room trying to decide if he needs to undress. Maybe Oikawa is fucking with him? At the very least he throws some of the clutter off his bedside shelf so it looks presentable. Just in case. “Wait, wait, Oikawa,” he pants, “are you serious about this video thing or—?“

“Hurry up,” Oikawa interrupts and there’s a quiet moan that accompanies his statement. Sporting a tent in his pajama pants, Iwaizumi leaps back into his bed as Oikawa adds, “Actually, I don’t think I could make you only watch for long. I’d want you to touch me too badly. Do you want to touch me?”

Iwaizumi palms his erection and barely manages a groaned, “Yes.”

“Say it, Iwaizumi.”

“I want to touch you,” he whispers. 

The phone trills in his ears for an incoming video request. Iwaizumi looks ridiculous in the forward camera, flushed from his manic cleaning spree and eyes wide with anticipation, but he hits accept anyway. It takes a second for the picture to stabilize, but when it does he heaves a quiet, “Oh fuck.” 

Oikawa must have the camera propped on his nightstand because he’s sprawled on his side wearing nothing but half the bed sheet and a flirty grin. With one hand he adjusts the angle of the camera while the other glides along his hard cock in lazy strokes. “Care to join me?” he asks. 

Iwaizumi yanks out his headphones and sets the phone aside so he can rip off his shirt. He spares a glance at the screen and the intensity of Oikawa’s gaze makes his own erection twitch in a plea for release. He shimmies out of his pants, kicks them off, and doesn’t break eye contact as his boxers follow. Oikawa bites his lip and says something he can’t hear. With a little more speed, Iwaizumi resituates himself on his bed and puts his headphones back in. 

“Hey,” he breathes, then immediately wants to slap himself. 

Oikawa giggles, the motion rolling through his taut stomach like a wave. “Hey,” he answers. “That was fast.” 

“Yeah, well,” Iwaizumi grumbles, glancing down at his cock bobbing against his stomach.

Oikawa’s grin softens for a moment, then regains its mischievousness. “Ever since you left I keep replaying that night,” he confesses. “I touch myself and think about it being you, think about you being here in my bed. Is that okay?”

“Yes,” Iwaizumi groans, taking himself in hand. It could’ve been embarrassing if he thought about it too long, but he throws himself headlong into the fantasy instead, desperate for the distraction. “I like that you think about me. I keep wishing I was there.”

The other man practically purrs his satisfaction. “Yeah? What would we do if you were here?”

“I, um, would—“ Iwaizumi stumbles over his words. He can visualize exactly what he’d like to do: he can almost feel the smooth skin of Tōru’s legs beneath his hands as he pulls them over his shoulders, so that he’s at the perfect angle to wrap his lips around the head of that perfect, pink cock. 

He has no idea how he’s going to say that out loud, however. 

The quiet has stretched on and he groans with a shy look at Oikawa. “Sorry, I don’t think I’m gonna be good at this,” he grumbles, covering his face in both hands.

“It’s not like I’ve ever done this before. You know I just like the sound of my own voice,” Oikawa says with a reassuring smile that does its job. Knowing that Oikawa is just as much a novice as he is at this brings Iwaizumi out of his head. He’s reminded that it’s _Oikawa_ on the phone with him, who has been nothing but understanding in this avenue. There’s no room for anxiety because it’s _Oikawa_ and they know each other. It’s understandable that he enjoys this even when he hasn’t broached this boundary with his girlfriend: Oikawa is his best friend, and he just hasn’t reached that comfort level with Ayane. Maybe when they’ve known each other longer. This, with Oikawa, it’s _fine._ Eventually they’ll outgrow this need and she won’t be any wiser.

Iwaizumi relaxes against the back of his bed and holds the camera to more fully display the evidence of his need. Even from the tiny screen he feels the weight of Oikawa’s eyes on him. He lets his hand wander back down his stomach and around his shaft, eyes fixed on Oikawa’s face. He can’t believe he’s already so hard. “I like the sound of your voice too,” he whispers. Maybe the other man will try to tease him about that admission later, but for now he needs Oikawa with his unwavering confidence to talk him through this. 

Mercifully, Tōru continues on, saving the teasing for another time. “Do you like the way I sound when I’m moaning your name?” His lashes flutter against his cheeks, and the hypnotic slide of his hand along his cock pauses so he can swipe a thumb across the glistening head. “Hajime?” 

God, it’s like everything about Tōru is designed to drive Iwaizumi crazy. Tōru licks his lips, the flash of pink drawing Iwaizumi’s gaze to the wicked grin on his face. “Say it again,” he hisses, desperate to be there. “Say my name again.” In bed, when Tōru talks it’s more than just sound: it’s the way Tōru digs his fingers into Iwaizumi’s skin, the heat of his breath against Iwaizumi’s lips when he moans into a kiss, or says his name. With his headphones in, it’s like Tōru is whispering in his ear; he can almost feel it.

A shiver dances across Oikawa’s shoulders, a wide grin on his face. “ _Hajime_ , it’s so fucking hot when you tell me what to do. When you see me in a few weeks, how do you want me? I want you to tell me how you want me.” 

“I want you on your back, I want to feel your legs around me while I suck you off,” he gasps, the words to his earlier fantasy coming to life aloud. 

“Ooh, that’s not fair,” Oikawa complains, though he’s biting back a grin. “I’ve waited all this time to be able to touch you again. Wouldn’t you rather have me on my knees? I could take off your pants and have your cock in my mouth- you like the way that feels, don’t you?”

Iwaizumi squeezes his eyes shut with a whine. Tōru is trying to wrest away control of this fantasy, and he wants to let him, but he sees the look of challenge in his glittering amber eyes and refuses to back down. Oikawa had said he wanted him to tell him what to do…

“Y-Yes, but I’m telling you how I want you, so you’ll be patient and keep your hands to yourself,” he growls. Oikawa sucks his lip between his teeth with a sharp gasp and that alone makes Iwaizumi moan, hips jerking into his hand. He had thought Oikawa’s desire to be ordered around was partly a flippant joke, but that is not the face of someone making light. It could be awkward if Iwaizumi is reading it wrong, but he ventures, “Are you going to be good and do what I tell you?” 

Oikawa presses his reddening face into his pillow and whimpers, “Fuck.”

It’s intoxicating, the surge of power Oikawa is handing to him. Iwaizumi grins, “You didn’t answer, Tōru.”

“God, yes, I’ll be good,” Oikawa whines. He’s flushed down to his heaving chest, lips parted as he pants, “Where do you want me to cum?”

“I want you to cum in my mouth so I can taste you,” he breathes. “I want you to say my name when you do.”

Oikawa looks ready to finish in his hand from that alone, but he seems to rally after a deep breath. “Fuck, yes, and what do I get for being good? After I cum for you.”

Iwaizumi groans, “What do you want, Tōru?”

“I want you inside me,” he gasps. The pace of his hand is uncontrolled, fast and sloppy. Heavy-lidded, glossy eyes are fixed on Iwaizumi as he arches against the bed. “I want you to f-fuck me with that big cock—“ Iwaizumi is forced to shove a fist against his mouth in order to keep his silence, but a guttural noise still rumbles in the back of his throat. All he can manage is the soft whine of the other man’s name as he works himself into a matching pace. “You c-could fuck me from behind,” Tōru gasps, “so I can feel just how big you are. I’ll be s-so hot and tight for you.” 

Iwaizumi indulges in the image of his cock swallowed in Tōru’s ass while he thrusts into him and there’s no way he’s going to last between that and Tōru’s ragged breath in his ear. “I’m so close, Tōru. Do you want me to pull out? Cum across your back, or—“ He swallows hard. Oh god, he’s really about to say this. “Or you want me to f-fill you up and cum inside you?” 

With a loud cry, Tōru throws himself against the sheets as he cums thick, white strands across his stomach. His brows are pinched and lips parted as the waves of his orgasm roll through him. He’s beautiful, truly, with warmth in his cheeks and his lean muscle shuddering through the pleasure. Iwaizumi almost pauses in awe of him, but Tōru blinks open his hazy amber eyes and gasps, “Hajime, baby, don’t stop.”

He fixates on the pet name, and there’s no time to wonder why that’s what pushes him over the edge because in the next moment he’s choking back a moan and spilling hot into his hand. It takes a few seconds of breathing before Iwaizumi blinks back to his senses and glances back to his phone.

A pleased smile curves across Oikawa’s lips and he murmurs, “Hey.” 

Iwaizumi shuts his eyes, drops his head back against the wall and chuckles, “Hey.”

“I bet you’re glad your room is on the other side of the house from your parents, huh?”

“Shittykawa, don’t talk about my parents right now!” he hisses, gesturing down at his abdomen. 

Oikawa picks up his phone with a laugh and brings Iwaizumi along with him as he retrieves a towel. “Sorry, yeah, I can admit that was bad timing. Aren’t you gonna clean up?” 

Sighing, Iwaizumi sits up. “M’tired,” he mumbles, reaching lazily for his shirt and wiping his hands on it. 

“Such a caveman,” Oikawa giggles as he hops back into bed. Iwaizumi is a little disappointed when he pulls the covers up over himself, but the disappointment fades when Oikawa props the screen right next to him, like they’re laying together.

“I don’t wanna move.” 

Another soft laugh floats from Tōru’s lips, easy and warm. “Gross,” he says, “but I guess I still like you.” 

Drawing his comforter over his bare shoulders, Iwaizumi is struck with the notion that he might enjoy doing this every night. Maybe it’s just the novelty of intimacy by phone, or of laying in bed with someone at the end of a day. But there’s the little voice in the back of his head that suggests maybe it’s just Oikawa. Which is a little startling. Sure, Tōru has an undeniable magnetism that has Iwaizumi cheating on his girlfriend without a second thought in the moment, but for it to be more is, well, something _else_. 

“Hey,” Tōru says, interrupting Iwaizumi’s train of thought. “Can I ask you something?”

Iwaizumi cocks an eyebrow. “What?”

Oikawa inhales, eyes closed, then meets Iwaizumi’s curious gaze with his exhale. “What do you think this is between us?” he asks. 

“What do I think this is?” Iwaizumi echoes. 

“Yeah, like, we keep doing stuff like this, so what do you think about it?” Oikawa clarifies, voice unwavering despite the nervous nibble he gives to one of his nails. 

“O-Oh, I… I don’t know,” a wide-eyed Iwaizumi answers. “It’s… good? We’re comfortable with each other so, I mean, that’s why it’s easy, right?” He coughs and adds with a guilty glance to the side, “I mean, I know it makes me shitty since I’m cheating on my girlfriend, but it doesn’t really count since it’s you. You're different.”

The expression that crosses Oikawa’s face is somewhere between amusement and frustration. Iwaizumi is an expert on Oikawa’s more subtle expressions and he thinks it’s more of the latter than anything. Tōru shuts his eyes in a silent prayer for patience, then merely shakes his head. “You’re a dumb brute,” he grumbles. 

“Wha- hey!”

“I expect a different answer when I come down for Christmas. Okay?” Iwaizumi glares but Oikawa cuts off his argument before it begins. “I’ll talk to you tomorrow, Iwa-chan. Good night.”

Iwaizumi squeezes in a short, “Good night,” before the call ends and he is left with a dark screen and a lot of questions he doesn’t want to ask himself.

***

“I’m so ready for tonight,” Ayane states as she drops her head to her textbook. “I think Takashi-sensei is trying to kill us.”

Iwaizumi frowns. He agrees with the sentiment about their professor on treatment modalities- though he finds the topic interesting- but he’s still unsure about the concept of going out. “You know I’m only nineteen, right?” he offers up. It’s the last excuse he has to try and wiggle out from this party.

Ayane looks up with a giggled, “Nobody would try to ID _you_ , Iwaizumi.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“You have an… intimidating air, sometimes,” she hedges in a placating tone. “It’s not a bad thing!” His frown deepens and she points from across the table. She grins, “Like that. If I didn’t know you better I would say you’re intimidating! Anyway, you have to come! We haven’t gone on a real date since we started dating. Studying at my apartment doesn’t count.”

Cheek on his palm, Iwaizumi pouts and grumbles, “Alright.” 

Ayane went back to reading, a small smile on her lips. Iwaizumi drew his phone into his lap.

_Do I have a mean face?_

_You’re just noticing?_

_Shittykawa_

_Haha_

_Your face isn’t mean_

_It’s all_

_Grr_

_In a sexy way_

  
Iwaizumi bites his lip and flips a page in the book he’s not reading. 

_That doesn’t make sense_

_Yes it does!_

_It’s like_

_When you glare and tell me what to do_

_Hot_

_You’re crazy_

_No way_

_Trust me_

_(・ω <) _

_You just be you_

_Sexy, frowny you_

_So my whole thing is to look mean and order you around?_

_Um_

_Y e s_

_Only you can get away with it_

_Hey_

_For Christmas break_

_I got a little extra time, so I’ll be there for two weeks now_

With giddy fingers Iwaizumi swipes to his calendar. Christmas break is only two more weeks away.

_Let’s hang out_

_(*☌ᴗ☌)｡*ﾟ_

_The whole time?_

_Yes_

_Hmm_

_What about girlfriend-chan?_

_She’ll be fine_

_Iwa-chan!_

_What_

_I don’t get to see you that often_

_I get to see her all the time_

_( ｰ̀εｰ́ )_

_W H A T_

_Geh_

_I just_

_I don’t like sharing_

“Iwaizumi?”

He jerks his head up from his phone and meets girlfriend-chan’s curious gaze. “Sorry?” 

“Do you want to go? You’re not even studying anymore.” She gives a wary, unsure glance at his phone.

Slipping his phone into his pocket, he clears his throat and shuts his textbook. “Yeah. Sorry, yeah. Oikawa was just talking about Christmas break.” 

Ayane perks up a little which sends a spike of guilt curling in his gut. Clambering to gather her own books, she joins Iwaizumi on his side of the desk and kisses his cheek. “Is he coming to see his family?”

“Oh, yeah. He’ll be here for a couple of weeks over the holiday.” 

“Oh, so are you going to hang out a lot?” she probes. She switches her books to one side and twines their fingers. “Maybe you can introduce me?”

Iwaizumi chews at his lip and tightens his guilty grip on her hand. “Um, yeah. Sounds good.”

***

_Sorry_

_It’s fine_

***

The music at the club is unbearably loud. Ayane was right though, because the bouncer doesn’t even look twice at Iwaizumi before he waves him through with the rest of the group. He has never experienced this side of society, with the pounding bass, cramped bar, the girls in short dresses and guys in fitted shirts despite the weather. His girlfriend in a short black dress hands him a glass with a straw which he sips while he wishes he was anywhere else. She flashes a brilliant smile and bounces to her group of girlfriends to do shots. Iwaizumi fidgets at the bar with the other two guys from their cohort. 

“Suzuki is super hot,” the guy to his left says, nudging him in the side. What’s his name? Morita? “Good job Iwaizumi.” 

The other guy, Saito, takes a swig of his beer and agrees, “Yeah. How’d you convince someone like that to go out with you?”

“Oh, she asked me out,” Iwaizumi answers. 

“What! Well how do you get someone like Suzuki to ask you out?” Morita gripes. “It must be the tall, dark and brooding thing you have going on. Girls love that shit.”

Iwaizumi snorts around his straw. “I’m not brooding.” 

“You’re all intense though,” Saito says. “Totally brooding.”

Intense. Intimidating. Does everyone here think he’s some kind of unapproachable grouch? If that’s the case, he’s pretty surprised he has a girlfriend too. His classmates continue talking about which girls in their building are cute. Iwaizumi wishes again to be somewhere else. It feels like being thrown a life preserver when Oikawa texts him. 

_Studying done!_

_This is club night right?_

_Yes_

_And I want to leave_

_Ooh_

_Are you drinking?_

_You’ll have more fun if you’re drunk_

_I wish I was there_

_I don’t_

_I bet you’d be a sloppy gross drunk_

_You’d take care of me though_

_(｡•̀ᴗ-)✧_

_Wouldn’t you?_

_Ugh_

_I guess_

_Hmm_

_The way I take care of you?_

Iwaizumi chokes on the last of his drink and slams the glass on the counter behind him. 

“You alright, Iwaizumi?” Saito laughs. 

Morita hits him on the back and adds, “Slow down man!” 

“S-Sorry,” he coughs. 

“Everything okay, Iwaizumi?” Ayane asks and she rejoins their group. “You dying on me?” Her cute face is flushed and scrunched in teasing concern. 

Iwaizumi shakes his head as she slides her arm around his waist. “Not dying,” he assures in a thin voice. In order to reciprocate he has to pocket his phone, leaving Oikawa’s text dangling. 

Ayane giggles. On unsteady feet she circles her arms around his neck and hangs off of him instead so he has to take hold of her waist. “Weeeell, since you’re not dying, come dance with me,” she pleads. 

His unanswered phone is burning a hole in his pocket. “Um, okay, I just, need to run to the bathroom first?”

“Hurry back!” she grins, sliding off of him with a flirty wave of her fingers. Behind her back, Morita and Saito each shoot a wide-eyed thumbs up at Iwaizumi. He’s pulling his phone into hand before he’s even made it to the bathroom line. 

_Yes_

_I would_

_If you wanted_

_Maybe when I’m in town?_

_It doesn’t bother you?_

_“I don’t like sharing”_

_¯\\_(⌣̯̀⌣́)_/¯_

_Better than nothing_

_Go dance_

_And send me a video_

_No way_

_Can I call you tomorrow?_

_Call me when you get home_

_It’ll be late_

_I don’t care_

_Call me_

_Ok_

_Good night_

_In case you fall asleep_

_( ് દ ് )_

Exhaling with a smirk, Iwaizumi puts his phone up, straightens his shirt in the mirror, and heads back out into the crowd. 

***

“Wah, Iwaizumi. Thanks for bringing me home,” Ayane giggles once they’re out in the cold autumn air.

Iwaizumi holds her up by the waist as they stumble down the sidewalk. “It’s no problem,” he assures. Her apartment isn’t much further now, a fact for which he’s grateful because he’s actually a little sweaty now after partially carrying her for the last fifteen minutes following dancing for who knows how long. He’d only had two drinks- he couldn’t reconcile the empty calories- but Ayane and her friends were a different story. While she didn’t seem drunk, she was definitely tipsy.

“Oh! This is my building!”

“Yep,” he grunts. “I’m gonna let you go so I can get your keys.”

Unassisted, she sways on her feet then does a cute turn which gives him time to dig her keys from their safe place in his pocket. “You’re so patient,” she sighs happily. “I knew you were a nice guy from the start! Even if the others think you’re all—“ she makes a frowny face then laughs. 

Iwaizumi purses his lips and gestures for her to hang onto him again. Once she’s clinging to his arm, they start up the stairs towards her unit. “This is just my face,” he grumbles. 

“It’s a good face,” she says with a placating grin.“Hey, you want to come in?” she asks when they’ve finally stopped in front of her unit. 

Fumbling at the lock, Iwaizumi stammers, “Um, I don’t know. I don’t want to piss off my parents by coming in super late. I’ll just make sure you get in bed.” The key turns and he pushes open the door, drawing her by the hand after him. “Come on.”

When the door shuts and they kick off their shoes and she her coat, her fingers hook into the waistband of his jeans and tug him back a step. “Maybe I need help changing,” she suggests. 

Iwaizumi’s cheeks start burning at the offer and he quickly flips on the overhead light to destroy the moody darkness. “I think you can handle it,” he replies. 

“Iwaizumi,” she pouts, taking a step to close the gap between them. 

He takes her hands in his and pulls them off his person. “You’ve been drinking,” he argues, guiding her further into the apartment. She’s still wearing a frown but follows obediently, until he sits her on her bed. Before he can protest, Ayane takes hold of the front of his shirt and kisses him. 

“Um,” he mumbles against her lips, trying to pull away with care. “Suzuki—“

“I know you’re a good guy. This is me consenting!” she replies trying to resume kissing him while slipping her hands beneath his shirt. 

A raging panic bubbles up from his gut, and Iwaizumi scrambles back a step, eyes anywhere but his girlfriend’s face. “I-I don’t think that’s how it works,” he squeaks.

Ayane shakes her head, rises to her feet and grins, “I promise, it’s totally fine.” She slips the straps of her dress off her shoulders, tugs the zipper at its side, and in another moment the little black dress is in a puddle around her feet. 

Ayane Suzuki is, as noted by Morita and Saito, objectively attractive. She’s slim and fit, with a cute face and easy smiles. Her long hair bounces in artificial waves around her shoulders, ending just above the swell of her breasts confined in a lacy, black bra. Iwaizumi’s eyes trail past her tiny waist to the matching black panties that accentuate the muscular line of her thighs. Words fail him. He turns his stunned, wide-eyed gaze back to her face, which is pink but also understandably proud. 

Iwaizumi realizes he should be excited about this, except that the only thought he can manage is an all-encompassing, ‘No, thank you.’

His heart is pounding in his ears. He blurts, “I should go!” as he turns and bolts. She yells his name but he’s already scooped up his shoes and opened the door without even putting them on. 

“What am I doing, what am I doing?” he repeats under his breath and he pounds down the stairs and onto the street. He doesn't pause to put on his shoes until he’s half a block away, and then he keeps his hurried pace towards the metro station. 

Keeping his hands to himself had been the right thing. He believes this, even if it probably would’ve been fine with her if he hadn’t. The complete, full-body rejection he’d experienced when she made her intentions about the night clear, though, that was weird. It was weird, right? Guys like Morita and Saito- even if they’d chosen to walk away like Iwaizumi did- would’ve been thrilled to even be in the position to walk away. Iwaizumi should’ve been excited or, or maybe had some difficulty leaving. He should have enjoyed kissing her at least, and not been overcome with panic when she touched him. He’d totally panicked. 

Iwaizumi shakes his head violently and wraps his arms around his churning stomach. This means something, and he really, really doesn’t want to think about what that is. Iwaizumi isn’t an over-thinker; Iwaizumi is a doer. He doesn’t want to think about why he hasn’t had sex with his girlfriend yet even when he’s already done it with Oikawa. 

(A man)

No, no, no. 

He’s just overly attached to Oikawa because they’ve known each other for as far back as his memory goes. Man or woman doesn’t really matter. He’s not an idiot: knows people can be attracted to a spectrum of genders or whatever. He’s still attracted to Ayane, but it must be this subconscious guilt about what he’s done preventing him from becoming physically intimate with her. 

He pulls at his hair and lets loose a frustrated noise into the night air. It crosses his mind that maybe he should finally-actually-really have a talk with Oikawa about their boundaries. 

Except the thought spurs such intense contention inside him that he dismisses it immediately. Iwaizumi stops in the middle of the sidewalk and stares up at the sky like the stars will provide him a second opinion, but they twinkle merrily their approval. Everything inside him begs for this _thing_ with Oikawa to keep going, but he’s not stupid enough to believe he can have them both. He has to make a choice. 

And he’s known Oikawa forever, but it’s one thing to hook up with him on occasion and another entirely to pursue a relationship. With a man. Who might not even want that. Oikawa can and has had any girl he’s ever wanted. No one in their right mind would give that up for a relationship so stigmatized it’d likely need to remain secret. Iwaizumi is going to have to make the logical choice. 

The sky overhead goes blurry and he realizes that he’s started crying. He’s not even with Oikawa; what the fuck is wrong with him? 

His phone begins to trill from his pocket and Iwaizumi wipes his face in his sleeve before fumbling the phone with frozen fingers. “Hello?” he sniffles. 

“Iwa-chan? Are you okay?” comes Oikawa’s concerned voice through the phone, so warm it makes Iwaizumi want to cry all over again. “You never called so I got worried.” 

“I’m f-fine. Just trying to get to the metro before the last train,” he lies with a hearty sniff. To make it true he takes off once more at a brisk pace. “It’s cold. Nose is runny. I’m alright.”

For a second Iwaizumi thinks he’s fooled him, but after a pause, Oikawa says, “We’ve known each other too long for that. What’s wrong?” 

“I…” Iwaizumi considers lying until Oikawa drops it. He doesn’t want to breathe his thoughts into life by talking about it. The moment they’re alive he’s responsible for addressing them and wouldn’t it just be easier to exist in this weird limbo? But he only realized the extent of his predicament fifteen minutes ago and it’s already making him anxious. Iwaizumi is a doer, not an over-thinker. Surprisingly, Oikawa is waiting patiently for his answer, so Iwaizumi admits, “I don’t know what I’m doing.” 

Oikawa acknowledges him with a soft hum. “Can you be a little more specific?” he asks. 

“I don’t know what I’m doing with this relationship,” he clarifies. 

“Ah. Did something happen?”

“No. That’s the problem.”

There’s a beat of quiet where Iwaizumi expects Oikawa to laugh. However, when he speaks, his voice sounds sullen. “Performance anxiety is normal. You’ll get over it.” 

With a frustrated growl, Iwaizumi snaps, “It's not like that. I mean, it is, but... I don’t know! I panicked! She took off her dress and I just- I left! I ran, actually.” This time Oikawa does chuckle. “It’s not funny,” Iwaizumi adds petulantly. 

“I mean, it’s a little funny,” Oikawa counters, sounding significantly more cheerful. 

“You’re such a dick,” Iwaizumi exclaims. He’s made it to the station in time, thankfully, and swipes his pass through the turnstile. 

“No I’m not!” Oikawa whines. “Just listen. I’ll ask you a question that’ll clear it all up but you have to be honest, okay? Also, if I’m on speaker, I’d highly recommend taking me off.” 

“Like I would have your loud mouth on speaker.” 

Oikawa scoffs, “Now who’s being a dick? Do you want my wisdom or not?”

Iwaizumi glares to himself, which probably makes him look like a delinquent considering the strange look he gets from the bored station attendant on the platform. “What’s the fucking question.”

If he didn’t know any better, he’d say Oikawa sounds smug as he asks, “How do you feel watching me get undressed?”

Iwaizumi ducks his head with a furtive glance around the empty train platform. Jesus, no wonder Oikawa told him not to be on speakerphone. He’s turning red: he can feel his ears burning. “What the hell, Oikawa?” he hisses. 

“Answer honestly!” Oikawa sings. 

“You know the fucking answer,” he grunts. “I’m not saying it out loud.” Oikawa undressing has been the highlight of the semester. He’s been masturbating to the visual since it first happened, but if he says that the other man’s ego is liable to explode.

Then his stomach flips, a little anxiously, in realization. 

“Oh,” Iwaizumi mutters. “God damn it.”

To his relief, Oikawa doesn’t laugh or tease. With more tact than he would normally afford, Oikawa says gently, “In my opinion, you don’t actually like women as much as you think you do.”

Iwaizumi doesn’t reply, but he doesn’t hang up either. He stares down the train tracks. He knew this was where his thoughts were leading him earlier, and it’s why he didn’t want to confront it. His chest is tight but he breathes into the receiver. Oikawa says nothing.

Iwaizumi jolts when the station attendant yells out, “Sir, are you thinking about jumping? It’s not worth it. Whatever you’re dealing with will pass.” He’s pacing warily towards him, radio in hand. He doesn’t look thrilled. 

Oikawa laughs softly in Iwaizumi’s ear and it’s enough to bring the ghost of a smile to his face. “Sorry, I’m fine,” he calls back. 

“Good, because it’s really inconvenient if you kill yourself here,” the man sighs. 

“How empathetic,” Oikawa mutters. 

The train is rumbling up towards the platform, so Iwaizumi gives an apologetic bow to the attendant. “I’ll be getting on,” he says. He boards an empty car and slumps into a seat. The phone is still pressed to his ear, but he still isn’t sure what to say. 

“I’m sorry,” Oikawa ventures to break the silence. “You must look miserable if they thought you were going to jump in front of a train.” 

Iwaizumi rests his head against the glass after the train lurches into motion and sighs, “I don’t know. I’m just tired and I really don’t want to think about it.” Now that he’s sitting, the night behind him, Iwaizumi is exhausted.

“Iwaizumi,” Oikawa chides, “you can’t just ignore it.”

“I’m not,” he lies. “I’m just not going to think about it right now.”

“But—“

He’s not mad at Oikawa, he’s not, but under his skin is a barely contained anxiety that Oikawa’s statement has spurred into sickening motion. _Maybe you don’t like women,_ he says, and Iwaizumi is trying not to panic because the suggestion slots into place, like Oikawa has simply hinted that Iwaizumi has been wearing the wrong size shoes his whole life, so try these on and, wow, these fit better, don’t they? Except that instead of changing shoes it’s his entire life that’s threatening to change and he just- he _can’t_. “What do you want from me, Oikawa?” he snaps, chest heaving and vision blurring. “You can’t just say something like that and expect me to just jump on board!”

Oikawa fires back a derisive laugh. “Oh, come _on!_ Can you really tell me the thought really never crossed your mind? You said I’m different but that’s bullshit! The things we’ve done aren’t just some kind of special exception to your straightness!” Oikawa sneers. “We’ve had sex! You can’t just wave that away by saying ‘no homo.’”

“Shut the fuck up,” Iwaizumi growls, digging his fingers into his hair to keep himself together. He’s too big for his skin, like it’s been stretched across his muscle and bone and is tearing away at the seams. He tries not to breathe: if his lungs expand too much they’re liable to crack his ribs and he can’t have his heart spilling out from his shredding skin. It hurts. He gasps. Shallow. Don’t move—

“Iwaizumi?” Oikawa’s voice has lost it’s derision. “Iwa-chan? Hey, you have to breathe.”

“Can’t,” he spits between gritted teeth. He can’t breathe. If he breathes, he loses, but he can’t _breathe._ A wheeze works its way out of his throat. There’s a clatter- his phone slips from his clammy hands and he curls up, fingers seizing handfuls of cloth as he grips his knees. To his right he hears the distant buzz of Oikawa’s voice from the phone. Iwaizumi trembles in his cocoon and prays that he’ll either remember how to breathe or die so that at least his chest will stop throbbing. 

Stupid, stupid, stupid Iwaizumi. _Did you really think you weren’t gay?_ Fat tears drip down his cheeks. A strangled sob falls from his lips. 

Of course he knew it was _something_. He knew, and that’s why he didn’t want to think about it, because the moment he had, this happened. Iwaizumi’s head is swimming and he really, _really_ needs to catch a breath before he dies. Panting, he takes his head in his hands, squeezes his eyes closed, then finally he manages a thin gasp, a little longer. It cools the fiery pain in his chest the tiniest bit. 

That little breath doesn’t destroy him. His blood and bones and heart are all inside him, he’s still in his skin. He’s still himself, for better or worse. For worse, because he doesn’t know that anything is actually better about the situation. Except, he is having an easier time funneling oxygen into his body. That is better. Iwaizumi huffs another breath, then another. Another. 

The tinny noise from the phone draws his watery gaze. Still dragging shuddering breaths into his lungs, Iwaizumi pulls his fingers from his hair, slow and deliberate. He taps the screen and it blinks to life, showing Tōru’s name and their still ongoing call, ten minutes past. With trembling fingers he picks up the phone.

“—if you just say something, please, please, Hajime—“

“Oikawa.”

Oikawa lets out a short sob of relief. His voice is thick as he cries, “F-Fuck, Hajime, I th-thought you were dying! Did you- no, you, you had a panic attack, and it’s my fault. I’m so sorry! You don’t have to think about anything, forget I said it—“

“Oikawa,” Iwaizumi sighs. He rubs his fingers into his chest, which is still tight but nowhere near as painful. “I’m… okay. It’s okay.”

“It’s not okay!” Oikawa croaks in his ear. “I shouldn’t have pushed it. Not like I did. That was just cruel, I’m a total ass. I just, I—well, it’s not about me, I can’t make it about me. I’m sorry. I know this isn't an easy thing and I shouldn’t have said what I did.” 

Iwaizumi’s throat tries to choke out his voice but he’s able to say, “Hey, hey. Apology accepted, so stop.” On the other end, Oikawa sniffs hard and makes a quiet noise of agreement. Before he can start back up, Iwaizumi continues, “I know it sounds stupid. I’m… being stupid, I get that. I just need some time. I just... I need time. Okay?” 

“Yeah, yeah of course,” Oikawa agrees. “I mean, you aren’t stupid! You aren’t. Just take your time and… and no matter what, you know I’m always going to be here for you. You know that right?”

Despite himself, the ghost of a smile tugs at Iwaizumi’s lips. “I know,” he answers, and he finds that he believes it. “But I think I need to hang up so I can figure out if I’ve passed my stop or not.”

Oikawa laughs, the sound of warm relief. “Right, of course. Can you just text me when you’re home? So I know you didn’t get murdered.” 

“Yeah, I’ll text you.”

He disconnects and slumps against the glass. It only takes a quick glance at the train map to see he’s two stops away, but he needs the space. The night can’t end soon enough. He longs for the thoughtless reprieve of sleep. Still, Iwaizumi has to sit for five more minutes on the train before a fifteen minute walk. He’s been ignoring this since Tokyo and he wants to keep pushing it off onto the back burner, but Tōru called him out. He can’t put back on shoes that don’t fit. 

In retrospect, he supposes he treated it exactly like Tōru said: an exception. He groans and thunks the back of his head against the glass out of embarrassment. So stupid. Trying to pretend that being with Tōru didn’t feel right was just lying to himself and everyone else. The final proof had been handed to him at Ayane’s apartment. Sex with Tōru wasn’t the exception.

He’s fucking gay. 

Iwaizumi jumps to his feet so he can pace out his discomposure in the empty train car as it slows into the station. The flush across his face has spread from his cheeks to his neck and his heart skips. He’s _gay._ It’s not even a case of attraction across a spectrum. He isn’t attracted to his girlfriend, though he can’t recall if he’s been attracted to a man before, either. Any _other_ man, because now there’s Tōru, or there’s always been Tōru, Iwaizumi sure as hell doesn’t know. A lifetime of friendship and trust didn’t spawn the kind of fire Iwaizumi feels when he’s with Oikawa- this consuming, hungry _inferno_. He wants him so badly that he fell into it before he’d even realized what it was. He’s _gay—_

The minute the train stops he’s off in a sprint towards his house, like he could outrun the thought if he’s only fast enough. He can’t, because he has to stop some time, but it doesn’t mean he can’t try.

***

When Iwaizumi wakes up, he feels like he’s been hit by a truck, but he’s made a decision. It’s an easy one, though that’s not to say he’s made the choice lightly. Around lunch time, he finally gets the text he’s been waiting for and calls back. 

“Suzuki,” he blurts the moment his girlfriend answers. “I’m so sorry.”   
  
To his immense relief Ayane laughs first before replying. “I was pretty surprised when you ran out! What the hell was that?” 

Iwaizumi inhales and glances down at the notes he’d scribbled on a post-it this morning. “I know this is pathetic, but I’ve never had a girlfriend, so I panicked because I have no idea what I’m doing.” 

“Oh!” Ayane exclaims. “I wouldn’t have guessed that you’ve never had a girlfriend.”

Part of him hopes that she will simply be too impatient to cope with his lack of experience. Maybe she’ll break up with him and he’ll be freed from this prison of expectations. Iwaizumi clears his throat and adds, “Yeah, so, I don’t think I’m ready for... all of that. All at once.” 

He’s not sure why he expected anything less than the noise of adoration that she makes. Ayane is _nice,_ way too nice. Of course she wouldn’t break up with him over something like inexperience. “Iwaizumi,” she gasps, “I wish you would’ve told me sooner! I don’t want to make you feel uncomfortable or anything. I’ll admit, I’m surprised but it’s no big deal. We can go slow.” 

Iwaizumi sighs, “Sorry, Suzuki.”

“Aww, I don’t mind,” she says. “It’s kind of refreshing _not_ to feel like I have to. I mean, um…” She trails off, sounding nervous and shy. “Well, I’ve been with someone before. Does that bother you?”

“What? No, I don’t care about that,” he replies. He really doesn’t, which is more related to that fact that he’s not attracted to her than anything else. However, he knew that coming into this conversation this time. It’s why plan B on his post-it notes is, in the event she doesn’t laugh at and break up with him (ideal), to encourage a slow approach. 

If he tries again in a more controlled environment, then maybe he’ll come around and develop the attraction. 

Not that he’s implying being gay is a choice, but, like, maybe for him. That’s a thing, right? It’ll be like exposure therapy, wherein he’ll gradually introduce more of the thing making him anxious and overcome his aversion. The female body, in this case. 

Genius, honestly. 

“You’re really sweet,” Ayane replies. In a softer tone she adds, “I’m glad you told me about all that because I was really worried that you just didn’t like me or the way I looked.” 

“N-No way! You’re gorgeous, I’m just an idiot,” Iwaizumi assures.

She exhales a noise of relief and sounds a bit more cheerful as she says, “Well! Now that _that’s_ all cleared up, when _can_ I see you again? Preferably without any alcohol, though I won’t rule out stress-eating. Hey! Let’s make a plan for something fun after finals!” 

“Well, aside from studying my schedule doesn’t change much, so pick a time and I’ll be there,” Iwaizumi replies. “Do you have something in mind for the break?” 

“Well,” Ayane drawls, “sort of? You can tell me if this is a terrible plan, okay?”

“Okay?”

Clearing her throat, Ayane asks, “Is your friend Oikawa single? _Not_ because I’m asking, of course!” 

Iwaizumi’s stomach plummets to his feet and he sounds harsher than he intended when he huffs, “Yes. Why?” 

“O-Oh so, he’s your best friend right, and my best friend Emiko is having a hard time getting over her breakup…” She trails off expectantly. 

He hates that less than thirty minutes into his plan Oikawa has managed to weasel his way into it. He also hates the accompanying surge of jealousy. However, he has no acceptable excuse that he can give his girlfriend as to why he doesn’t want to set up Oikawa with her friend, so he mutters, “You want to do a double date.”

“I mean, just something fun for a night!” she clarifies. “I want her to remember there are other guys out there so she’ll stop pining over this loser. Seriously, the guy was a jerk. Is your friend cute?” 

Wow, this conversation keeps getting better. He mumbles, “I... guess?” Cute isn’t a word he would use to describe Oikawa, but the words he _would_ use are also unacceptable. 

Ayane hums like she’s thinking. “Send me a picture so I can get her on board,” she says. “I’ll plan the rest! Besides, I want to meet your best friend. You’ve met mine, it’s only fair.” 

“I’ll ask him,” Iwaizumi acquiesces. “But he’s a stupid flirt so tell your friend not to get attached.” 

“Honestly, that’s perfect in this case,” Ayane giggles. “Thanks, Iwaizumi. Can I see you tomorrow before class?” 

“Of course. See you then, Suzuki.”

They hang up and Iwaizumi crumples his post-it note plan into a ball. He’s physically sick at the idea of trying to hook anyone up with Oikawa, which is stupid if he really wants to try and flush the man out of his system. Iwaizumi scowls at his phone and jabs at their text thread where he’d never replied to the message awaiting him when he awoke. 

_Are you feeling okay today?_

_I’m fine_

_Hey_

_When you’re in town, Suzuki wants to do a double date with her sad single friend_

_Because she wants to meet you_

_Oh_

_That’s still a thing_

_I’m figuring things out_

_Right_

There’s a long enough delay in their messaging that Iwaizumi reluctantly skulks downstairs to join his mom for lunch. He’s spread out his textbooks and is halfway through a page of notes when Oikawa finally replies. 

_Fine I’ll do your double date_

_Don’t blame me if your girlfriend falls for me too_

_(｡•̀ᴗ-)✧_

The roiling jealousy in Iwaizumi’s gut hits a peak. His pencil lead snaps into the paper with the force of his grip. 

Plan B sucks. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next chapter: hot sexy mess


	3. Part Three

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I've been chipping away at this chapter on my phone during down time, and now my predictive text is f i l t h y.
> 
> So, I really hope you enjoy the sacrifice ;) 
> 
> You know, when I start writing something that'll have explicit smut, I always struggle with this question: will I spell it 'come' or 'cum?' I went with the latter this time, but it feels so raunchy, haha. You know what else? There's like, zero euphemisms for the balls that don't make me cringe a bit. I used exactly one here to make it at least kinda clear they're not being neglected, but I had to look away from the screen as I typed it. 
> 
> Maybe I'm just a prude.

For two weeks, semester exams consume most of Iwaizumi’s waking brain power. He’s a good student: years of studying with Oikawa have rubbed off on him, and his grades usually take people by surprise. He throws himself into finals with zeal, which keeps his thoughts from bouncing too frantically between Oikawa and Suzuki. There's less time to fret about his love life and an impending night out with his girlfriend and secret side piece if he’s busy memorizing muscle groups of the body forwards and backwards. 

He doesn’t hear much from Oikawa outside the occasional text about studying for his own tests. With Suzuki, though, there’s no way Iwaizumi can avoid her: they’re at the same school, in several of the same classes, and she’s still his girlfriend. Despite this, Iwaizumi is clear in his dedication to his studies, so she either doesn’t notice the emotional distance since the night at her apartment or won’t say anything about it. It’s like how Oikawa hasn’t asked him about the Train Conversation. 

The Train Conversation, or the _you might be gay and so deep in the closet that you’re basically in the plot of a beloved children’s book series_ , talk. 

It’s a topic Iwaizumi is dwelling on when he isn’t studying for tests. Not that anyone knows it except himself and his Incognito browser. He can’t talk about it with Oikawa, not yet and especially not when it’s sometimes yielding more questions than answers. So many questions. Why are there so many terms? If Iwaizumi didn’t even question Oikawa topping (and there’s a new term), does that make him, like, _more_ gay? Does he have to stop playing volleyball? What happens if two guys like taking on both roles? And then somehow he’s reading a bunch of discourse on the negative effects of heteronormative gender roles on gay relationships. 

It’s a lot; he goes back to muscle groups. 

Iwaizumi has never studied so hard in his life. Consequently, his first college semester grades are impressive; willful ignorance is a powerful force. 

But the end of exams means Iwaizumi can avoid it no longer. Their joint families have decided to welcome Tōru back with a hot pot dinner. It would be terribly uncharacteristic if Iwaizumi were to avoid it. 

It's how he finds himself standing in the snow with his mother and Tōru’s mom, sister and nephew, waiting for his taxi. 

“Ooh, Tōru’s going to be so excited when he sees everyone!” Oikawa Kaoru squeals as she bounces at the end of the snowy driveway. 

Hajime fidgets next to her, having been roped into holding a sign made by Tōru’s sister, Kimiko, who is trying to get her son Takeru to look invested in their welcoming party. The sign, in glittery letters, reads, ‘Welcome Home Tōru!’ and looks ridiculous in Hajime’s hands. His mom glared at him, though, when he tried to argue about the sign. So he waits with their combined families holding a shiny poster and tries not to think about how much he wants Tōru. 

The taxi rounds the corner and Hajime’s stomach jumps into his throat in anticipation. They haven’t talked about anything outside exams and travel plans in the days since the Train Conversation, and he hasn’t seen Tōru’s face since their racy video chat. Iwaizumi has looked forward to their reunion as much as he’s wanted to avoid it. Tōru is still his best friend, even when Iwaizumi isn’t sure what the rest of the relationship is. Aside from that, their families know nothing about what’s been occurring and the last thing he wants is to draw attention to the fact that something is different between them. 

Despite the uncertainty, Iwaizumi cracks a smile when Tōru jumps from the taxi. He’s brilliant and beautiful with a shining grin as he emerges and takes in their little group. They scream their welcome: Kaoru, Kimiko and Takeru surround him with a hug, Hajime ditches the glittery sign and drags his luggage from the car while Fumi discreetly pays the cab fare before Kaoru can notice. When Tōru is released from his family’s embrace, he turns to Hajime who is hovering nearby with his suitcase. Their eyes meet, a little anxious around the edges because if Tōru is anything like Hajime right now, he’s bursting with a thousand questions that can’t be asked. Then a warm smile softens Tōru’s features and he tentatively holds out his arms with a quiet, “Hey.” 

So much relief floods him that his knees go weak; Hajime throws himself into Tōru’s hug with a vengeance. “Hey,” he whispers as he squeezes the air out of his friend’s chest to a chorus of aww’s from their family. He doesn’t want to let go, but it’s probably been longer than is appropriate by the time his reluctant hands fall away. Hajime hopes Tōru’s lingering grip on his arm is an indication that he feels the same. 

“I expect this kind of welcome every time I come home, now!” Tōru tells them all with an imperious grin. 

“I told you, mom,” Takeru retorts. 

“Yeah, this is a one-time deal, little brother,” Kimiko informs, throwing an arm around her younger brother’s waist. “After this, you’ll be old news.” 

Tōru squawks his indignation and turns to their mom, who shrugs as if there’s nothing more she can do. “You people are heartless,” he complains, taking hold of his suitcase. “I’m moving in with Iwa-san.”

“Hajime and I will give you all the attention you want, Tōru,” Fumi teases. 

“Speak for yourself,” Hajime retorts. He keeps his twitchy hands glued to the suitcase handle to prevent them from giving Tōru any further attention. 

Thankfully, Tōru takes away the possibility when he links arms with both their mothers, who laugh. Takeru has already rolled his eyes and started back into the house, Kimiko on his heels. “We’re making hotpot,” Kaoru tells him as they drag the guest of honor up the sidewalk. “Let’s go get warm and you can tell us all about your semester!”

Hajime brings up the rear of the entourage. There’s a bittersweet ache in his chest at the sight before him, a reminder that their families are irreparably entwined. If he and Tōru have a relationship and it’s discovered, the damage from the fallout of their families would be heartbreaking. He can’t do that to his parents, or Kaoru. He can’t be gay, and definitely not for his best friend. 

At the doorway, Tōru shoots him a look over his shoulder, a smile that is questioning and curious and warm all at once. Hajime is well aware of the risks that come with wanting more with Tōru, but there’s no world in which he can do anything but smile back. 

*** 

As always, Oikawa knows when Iwaizumi is anxious. The first moment they have alone, he uses this knowledge to ask, politely, “What classes are you taking next semester?” 

Except a question so generic only makes Iwaizumi acutely aware that things are weird between them. Their mom’s are in the kitchen cleaning, and Kimiko and Takeru left to go home. Hajime’s father had already stopped by to say hello. It would have been weird if Iwaizumi had excused himself too. As Tōru sits across the kotatsu from him asking about his school, all Iwaizumi can do is think of the damn Train Conversation and wish he had gone home already. 

“Uh. Biology, math. Um, a class on injuries, second level anatomy and physiology, and entry psych,” he finally answers. “You?” 

Oikawa waves a hand and sips at his tea without once looking at Iwaizumi’s face. “I don’t know. Some kind of communications class and sports management thing. Other stuff. My advisor makes my schedule for me; I just show up when I’m supposed to.” 

“Uh, shouldn’t you take more interest in your schedule?” Iwaizumi asks. 

Oikawa shrugs. “I get good grades and help win volleyball games. They give me a good schedule.” They lapse into a strained silence wherein they each fidget with their cups. “Have you… been okay?” Oikawa ventures. He’s still staring down into his tea.

It’s disconcerting to see Oikawa Tōru be so reserved. No, Iwaizumi thinks, not reserved: uncertain. They’re tiptoeing around each other like a minefield. 

It’s awful. 

“Oikawa,” he starts, frustration tight in his throat. The other man finally meets his eyes. His expression is cool, but he hasn’t stopped twirling his cup in his hands. “I’m trying, okay?”

“Are you?” Oikawa fires back. 

Shooting a worried glance to the hallway and the distant chatter of their parents, Iwaizumi lowers his voice and hisses, “I’ve thought about it.” 

Oikawa scowls and drops his chin into his hand. “So then you really decided to keep dating Suzuki.” 

“W-Well, kind of, but, I don’t know,” Iwaizumi mutters. “I thought maybe if I tried it a little longer, things would be different. I’d be different. It’s just… I don’t know! There’s a lot to sort through, okay?” 

Oikawa shuts his eyes, brows pinched like it pains him to hear that. He’s quiet for a moment, choosing carefully what to say. Iwaizumi wants to take him by the shoulders and shake the answers out of him. “Okay,” Oikawa answers slowly, “so when it doesn’t change anything, are you going to stay with her because that’s what you think you’re supposed to want? Do you think you’ll be happy like that?” 

Cheeks coloring, Iwaizumi averts his eyes from the man across from him. If the roles were reversed, Iwaizumi wouldn’t believe himself either. ‘ _Maybe_ and ‘ _I don’t know'_ aren’t exactly the words of someone who knows what they’re doing. “It’s just… easier this way. Isn’t it?” he replies. 

“Has anything about your relationship with her been easy?” Oikawa scoffs. “You don’t even want to see her naked. Why are you trying so hard to pretend you do?” 

“Shut up,” Iwaizumi hisses. 

“Wouldn’t you be happier if we were together?”

Iwaizumi’s heart rockets into his throat. “What are you saying?” he whispers. Oikawa doesn’t reply with words, but Iwaizumi can make out the faint presence of a growing blush on his cheeks. After a moment, his honey eyes flicker open and fix him with a pointed stare. “Oikawa—“

“Boys!” Oikawa Kaoru yells from the other side of the little house. “We need someone tall!” 

They both flinch at the interruption, but Tōru jumps to his feet with a fake smile as perfect as it is plastic. “Guess that’s me, since you never made it over six feet,” he sings.

“Bastard,” Iwaizumi growls as he leaps up in response. It almost feels normal as they shove each other down the hallway vying for the lead, but ultimately Tōru is the one who bursts into the kitchen first. 

“Put this up top,” Tōru’s mom orders him, pointing at the hot pot. “I don’t want to get a chair.”

“You just wanted me to come home because you miss the free labor,” Tōru jokes easily, as he hadn’t looked ready to break down moments ago. 

“That’s why we haven’t kicked Hajime out,” Fumi adds. “What’s the point of having kids if not for the free labor?” 

“Wow, Mom. Thanks.” 

“Love you, sweetie.”

Both Oikawa's share a matching grin at the Iwaizumis’ expense. “Are you staying the night, Hajime?” Kaoru asks. 

Instinctually, his eyes seek out Tōru. The taller man looks away. “No,” Hajime answers, the word bitter on his tongue. 

“I’m too tired,” Tōru declares. “Besides, Iwa-chan is making me go on a double date tomorrow night, so I’ll see enough of him then.” 

Both their moms squeal. “Give me all the details,” Fumi says directly to Tōru. “You know how shy he is about his dating life.” 

The statement spurs a sickening churn in Hajime’s stomach. It worsens when Ayane isn’t the first person to come to mind as Tōru smirks, “That’s because he hasn’t had one until a few months ago.”

“That’s mean, Tōru,” Kaoru snaps, swatting her son in the arm. “Not everyone dates around like it doesn’t mean anything.” To Hajime, she says, “Don’t listen to him,” and he almost feels worse. He had almost forgotten that Tōru can date whomever he wants just by virtue of being who he is. Unlike Hajime. Why the hell would Oikawa want to date him?

“I think I’m gonna go home; thanks for having me,” he blurts, turning on heel and fleeing the room. He faintly hears his mom call after him, hears Kaoru scolding Tōru, but he kicks on his shoes and bounds out into the snowy evening without looking back. 

“I’m home,” he calls a few minutes later, and when his dad tries to ask him how Tōru is, he adds, “Sorry, I don’t feel well.” It isn’t a lie. He bee lines on shaking legs for the bathroom, clings to the toilet and throws up. When the remnants of dinner have left him, he collapses onto the cool tile with a groan. 

“Are you okay son?” his worried dad asks through the door. 

“Ate too much,” he replies. “I’m fine.” His dad lingers a moment longer, then gives his reluctant acceptance. 

His parents are kind. Except, they wouldn’t be if they knew why he was stress-hurling a perfectly good dinner. What can he say? _Thanks for all of the support but you know the wedding and grandkids you always wanted? Not happening because I’m gay. Also, good luck with that, since you can’t ever tell anyone you have a gay son even though they’ll ask why I’m still single at thirty. I’ll be a source of shame for you forever now._

Perfect. 

Iwaizumi clutches his stomach, but even as he thinks it, Tōru’s voice echoes: _Wouldn’t you be happier if we were together_? It’s a gut instinct that answers, a simple outcry of _Yes_. He can picture it easily, a life not unlike they’ve always lived: breakfast, school and studying, visits home, together, together, together. He desperately wants it to be so; life would be so much easier if that wasn’t true. 

It seems obvious now, to look back and realize that he’d never wanted anyone else because there was always Tōru. Tōru, who makes him feel things he hasn’t with anyone else. It is overwhelmingly unfair that he shouldn’t be able to be with someone with whom he is so undeniably happy. 

His phone buzzes and he groans again, because he knows it will be his best friend before he even looks at the screen. 

_Are you okay?_

_Yeah_

_I’m fine_

_No you’re not_

_Eh_

_Please talk to me_

Iwaizumi stares at the blinking cursor until his screen times out. Train Conversation. At least this time he can breathe. He’s anxious, but more than anything, he’s tired. He swipes the screen back to life.

_I’m not like you_

_What’s that supposed to mean_

_You’re so confident_

_Like it’d be so easy to be_

_With a guy_

_Oh_

_It isn’t easy_

_But you said it would be_

_EasiER than lying, not easy_

_It’s scary_

_But I think it could be worth it_

_If it’s you_

His stomach gives another lurch, not entirely unpleasant this time. It seems silly to be surprised at his friend’s willingness to push boundaries. Tōru is a leader: he’s always moved forward in the face of uncertainty. Though, it’s sometimes to his own detriment, which is usually where Iwaizumi offers balance. It’s just another reason he wonders if he should ignore the insistence his instincts keep trying to force. He rereads the words and his heart flutters, but he can’t allow himself to be swept up in Oikawa’s fearlessness. If Oikawa won’t, Iwaizumi must be the one to proceed with caution. 

_What if it’s not though?_

_Lots of things could go wrong_

_Family, school. Your pro career?_

_It’s not accepted_

It’s a few minutes before Tōru replies.

_We’d still have each other_

Iwaizumi doesn’t know what to say to that, and neither, it appears, does Oikawa have anything to add. 

***

Iwaizumi spends twenty minutes with the taller man on the metro. Oikawa’s wearing a crisp, white button-up, half tucked into fitted jeans that leave him looking impossibly lean. A navy pea coat and loose scarf top off the stylish ensemble. Twenty minutes Iwaizumi spends: close enough to breathe in the sharp cologne on Oikawa’s neck, to trace with his eyes the curl of soft chestnut hair, to imagine unbuttoning each button of his shirt. When they finally walk into the karaoke building at which they are supposed to meet Ayane and her friend, Iwaizumi is antsy with the need to touch him. 

However, their texts throughout the day were sporadic and short, about where they’d meet and what time and not at all about Iwaizumi’s thoughts on, _We’d still have each other._ Not that Iwaizumi brought it up when he could have; he had been a coward about it. So it doesn’t feel right to touch Oikawa even in passing when he hasn’t responded. And he wants to respond, because, while Iwaizumi is the more cautious of their duo, he can’t deny the simple evidence of so many years of friendship. 

They _have_ always had each other, no matter what. 

He wants a chance to talk through it though, about what it means and what worries him. There is so much to worry over, and he wants to know that Oikawa has really considered it all. With his hopes pinned on a professional, very _public_ career in a conservative country, Oikawa has more to lose between them. Iwaizumi can’t be the reason Oikawa gets blacklisted from the J-League. 

Iwaizumi wants to fast forward through the evening already, and it hasn’t even started. 

The karaoke box is warm and noisy, promising a good time in exchange for their allowances. Oikawa makes breezy conversation with the attendant while they stake their claim for the future group of four. 

Iwaizumi winces when some of the first words Oikawa has spoken to him in at least fifteen minutes are, “Text your _girlfriend_ that we’re here already.” 

He can’t help catching the taller man by the arm as he removes his jacket. Oikawa’s neutral brown gaze flicks down towards the contact point, then he shrugs out of the loose grip. With a nervous swallow, Iwaizumi presses on, “About… that. Oikawa, when we go home, can we talk?” 

At once, the handsome man’s face becomes a pleasant mask of smiles. “Oh, Iwa-chan,” he simpers, “who says I’m going home with you?”

Iwaizumi’s blood runs cold.

“I mean, I can’t be hung up forever on something that won’t happen,” Oikawa continues, folding his coat and scarf like there’s nothing wrong with what he’s saying. “So maybe Sad Bestie will take me home, yeah?” He offers an enthusiastic grin, except it’s fake fake _fake_ and Iwaizumi’s head is spinning—

“But, I- I just thought we should talk first! Before we decide on something,” the shorter man stammers. The situation and the room are spinning wildly out of control. He squeezes at his temple and frowns, “Don’t go home with her!” 

“Why shouldn’t I? You and I aren’t together,” Oikawa snaps. 

“But we could be!” Iwaizumi exclaims, and there’s a crack in Oikawa’s charming façade, a hesitant flicker in the softening of his eyes. 

He parts his lips, closes them. “Don’t do this to me right now,” Oikawa finally pleads. 

“Then don’t go home with her,” Iwaizumi demands. The moment the words permeate the space between them, he knows it was the wrong thing to say: he has no right to demand this; he cannot be betrayed when he did nothing to indicate his feelings.

Oikawa’s face hardens. He tosses his bangs from his forehead with a haughty laugh of, “I’ll do what I want.” 

Iwaizumi is still glaring at the other man when, a few moments later, there’s a knock on the door. It takes a split second for Oikawa to resume his cheerful persona; Iwaizumi is another matter. The two women burst into the room with wind-chilled cheeks and Ayane greets them, “I’m sorry we’re late!”

Oikawa is forced to nudge Iwaizumi from his angry daze. “Introduce me already!” he says with a grin. 

“Ah, sorry,” he mutters. “This is Oikawa Tōru.”

At once Oikawa leaps into action with a flirty smile and friendly bow. “Thanks in advance for showing me a good time tonight, ladies,” he greets. 

“It’s nice to meet you, finally!” Ayane replies as she unzips her puffy coat and unwinds the fluffy scarf from her neck. “I’ve heard so much about you, Oikawa. I’m Suzuki Ayane.” She gives her quiet friend a nudge with her foot. 

Iwaizumi doesn’t really remember much about Fujiwara Emiko from the time at the birthday party club night. She’s pretty in a way that differentiates her from her friend: taller, willowy where Ayane is short and strong; cool to her lively. She offers them an understated smile and a short wave as she says a simple, “Hey. I’m Fujiwara Emiko.”

An anxious gloom settles on Iwaizumi’s shoulders when Emiko and Oikawa share a calculating glance. He wonders if Emiko is the type to bring someone home for a one-night stand. He wonders if she’ll be into Oikawa, but, of course she will, because everyone is always into Oikawa at a surface level. 

Then Ayane is sliding into the space beside him, giving him a soft hug with sparkling, eager eyes. “Hey, Iwaizumi,” she grins, up on tiptoe to kiss him. “This should be fun, huh?”

He has to tear his eyes away from where Oikawa is politely gesturing for Emiko to sit. He has to do this; just for one night. Sliding an arm around Ayane’s waist, he agrees, “Yeah, I think so.” 

“Come on now! We’re here to have fun, not to watch you two make eyes at each other,” Oikawa yells as he jingles a tambourine at the couple before throwing it at Iwaizumi. He manages to catch it before it hits him in the face. “Oops!” Oikawa giggles when Iwaizumi shoots him another glare. “Sorry Iwa-chan! Who wants to sing?” 

“Let’s sing together, Emi,” Ayane cheers. She picks up the electronic board and quickly makes the first selection for the night. Oikawa pointedly ignores Iwaizumi’s glances in the womens’ favor. 

For the first time, Iwaizumi fears that maybe he has taken Oikawa for granted for a little too long.

***

They can’t easily ignore each other in a karaoke box wherein they are half of the party, but the conversation manages not to stray from safe topics which makes it bearable. Iwaizumi is coaxed into singing but not by Oikawa, though he feels the prickle of his glare on occasion while he fumbles through shitty pop songs to the laughter of their dates. Snacks and drinks are ordered, though both he and Oikawa abstain from letting either of the older women order them alcohol, a fact which gives Iwaizumi some private sense of relief: there’s no telling what an uninhibited Oikawa would do. 

In fact, most of the time passes in such a normal manner that Iwaizumi snorts on his water when Ayane, after a sly look at an annoyed Emiko, asks, “So Oikawa, why don’t you have a girlfriend and are you looking to change that?”

Emi hushes her, elbowing her friend in the side, but Oikawa laughs. “Sorry, but I, too, have recently experienced a heartbreak, Aya-chan,” he drawls. “I wasn’t ready to get back in the dating game. Maybe that will change though.” He bats his eyes towards Emiko, who returns his flirty grin with an unimpressed look of her own, though she quickly bursts into a small laugh. 

“The dating game sucks,” Emiko counters. “I have no desire to re-enter it.” 

“Love is suffering,” Oikawa agrees, pressing a hand to his heart. He turns his shrewd honey eyes towards Ayane and Iwaizumi. “Oh, to be as lucky in love as these two, right? It’s enough to make a man _jealous.”_

Iwaizumi presses his mouth into a line, cheeks coloring, and his girlfriend gives an awkward laugh. It’s the first direct thing OIkawa has said in at least the last hour; it figures it would be snide. “Maybe you’d have better luck if you had a real personality,” he grumbles, narrowing his eyes at Oikawa. 

“Iwaizumi!” Ayane scolds. 

“What? We’re friends, I’m allowed to say it.”

Oikawa waves the comment away with an airy retort. “It’s alright, Aya-chan,” he assures, narrowing his eyes right back. “He’s mean to show he cares. I’m sure you know how it is. Sometimes I’m surprised he has a girlfriend with how terribly he communicates his feelings.”

“Um, right,” Ayane replies, her smile faltering. 

It’s petty, but Iwaizumi tightens his grip on his girlfriend’s waist and says, “You don’t have to be polite to him when he’s being rude. Sometimes Oikawa decides that he knows everything about other people before they even get a chance to _talk_.” 

“Are… are you two fighting?” Emiko interjects with a curious look between the two men. 

“No,” they both answer. 

Ayane looks askance at Oikawa, then turns her face back to Iwaizumi. There is a stiffness in her fingers as she takes his hand, a rigidity he reflects from the sudden action. At least he knows it’s coming when she kisses him this time. He tries to think about enjoying it and not the weight of Oikawa’s relentless eyes on his neck. “Okay, then” she offers hesitantly. “I’ll be right back. I’m going to go to the bathroom.” 

She rises quickly, tugging at her sweater and returning Emiko’s questioning look with a short shake of her head. When the door shuts behind her, Emiko says to a fuming Iwaizumi, “She’s too nice to say it, but you’re being weird.” Oikawa bursts out laughing at Iwaizumi’s dumbfounded surprise, until she adds, “You too, unless you’re always like this. And I thought I was a mess.”

“I may be a mess, but I’m a _hot_ mess,” Oikawa declares. 

“Well you certainly don’t lack confidence,” Emiko notes. 

“Emi-chan,” Oikawa pouts. The nickname grates on Iwaizumi’s ears. No offense to Emiko because she seems objectively fine, but Iwaizumi doesn’t want a rival’s nickname falling from Oikawa’s lips. “We both know we’re here to be set up, and you wouldn’t have come if I wasn’t attractive,” the source of Iwaizumi’s frustration continues. “So let’s skip to the part where we make out and—“

“Oikawa!” Iwaizumi growls. 

Emiko wrinkles her nose but shrugs. “I can’t believe I’m desperate enough for this to work for me right now,” she grumbles. Iwaizumi’s continued protests die in his throat before he even breathes them into life. Oikawa slips an arm around her back with another glance at Iwaizumi, then he turns and presses a burning kiss against Emiko’s mouth. 

The door swings open and Ayane chokes on her shock. “Oh!” she squeaks, turning her look of helpless surprise to Iwaizumi. Iwaizumi grits his teeth so hard he can hear his jaw grinding. “O-Okay, Emi, jeez! Get a room,” Ayane jokes as she sits, though her face is red and she picks up the music selector in an attempt to look nonchalant. 

When Oikawa tears away from her, Emiko is in a heavy-lidded daze with which Iwaizumi is all too familiar. He knows the soft press of skillful lips, the slide of Oikawa’s tongue against his. It’s every bit as breathtaking as the woman’s reaction indicates. He knows, and it feels like he’s being force fed glass. 

“That deserves a song,” Emiko laughs, snatching the selector from her friend. 

Iwaizumi hasn’t managed to rip his furious eyes from the other couple. If Oikawa notices, he doesn’t look up from where he’s poring over the music list with Emiko. Meanwhile, Ayane tugs at Iwaizumi’s sleeve and whispers, “What happened while I was gone?”

“I told you he was like this,” he growls. Another song starts playing and Oikawa and Emiko jump up with microphones. “Goal achieved.” 

“No kidding, wow,” she mutters. She looks up through her lashes, then a shy grin tugs at her lips. “Well. Emi’s pretty brave like that too. I don’t doubt her part in it at all,” she giggles, placing a hand on his knee. Iwaizumi tenses but she carries on, kissing the corner of his mouth. “Should I take notes?”

Warmth floods his cheeks. This is - wow. All he’s done since the apartment incident was throw himself further into the slow-relationship agenda, which hasn’t exactly worked for him the way he’d hoped since he’s still pretty undoubtedly gay for his best friend. “Well, um,” he hedges with a brief glance at Oikawa, who sneers at him mid breath in his song. Right, that reminds him: he’s also fucking pissed right now. “Yeah, good idea,” he finally answers, with what he hopes is an enthusiastic smile. 

He’s lying if he says he doesn’t want Tōru; desire and jealousy are eating through him like acid. Iwaizumi does have a girlfriend, though, who can, in theory, meet the same needs as Oikawa can. _Wouldn’t you be happier if we were together,_ he thinks in Tōru’s voice, just as Ayane presses a kiss to his mouth. Her lips move slow against his, savoring then parting so her tongue can dart across his bottom lip. When Tōru does that same thing, it feels like a lighting strike from Iwaizumi’s mouth to his groin, and this… does not. He knows he’s frowning, but he can’t back out now, not with Oikawa judging. He draws a hand across her waist, thumbs into her hip bones and she shivers, tests the feel of her tongue against his. 

The mechanics are all perfectly correct, but his gut still burns, sick and acidic like he could hurl gasoline. 

They kiss until the current song ends and Ayane draws away with an exhilarated smile which Iwaizumi does his best to mimic. The moment her eyes seek her friend’s Iwaizumi falters, presses a hand to his churning stomach, and looks for Oikawa. The taller man raises an apathetic eyebrow and rolls his eyes. He mouths the word, ‘Liar,’ at him, but says aloud, “Bathroom break! Be right back.”

Iwaizumi watches him go; only for a moment does he consider that it could be a bad choice. “Me too,” he grunts, before stalking Oikawa to the bathroom. He hesitates outside the door, then pushes his way inside and meets with the man’s back to the sink. The door shuts behind him, encasing them in a bubble of muted noise. “Oikawa,” he mumbles. 

Oikawa turns, shakes his wet hands in Iwaizumi’s direction and drawls, “What?” 

Iwaizumi advances a few steps, then stops before he traps Oikawa against his will. The jealousy burning inside him begs for release, tempts him to lash out, and he exhales trying to wrestle it under control. “This is stupid,” he says. 

Oikawa rolls his eyes as he dries his hands. “I don’t know, I’m having fun. Haven’t been to karaoke since we went with Mattsun and Makki over the summer.” 

A weak smile tries to make itself known before Iwaizumi remembers he’s supposed to be angry. “You know what I mean. The… kissing.” Oikawa stares back, his nonresponse a match to all the fuel in Iwaizumi’s chest. He snaps, “Why are you all over her?”

Finally Oikawa’s face twists into disdain. He crosses his arms and scowls, “Oh, I dunno. Because I don’t want to be hung up on someone who doesn’t feel the way I do about him? You have a girlfriend that’s all over you! Get off my case.”

“You're the one who didn’t want to talk!”

Oikawa’s face splits in a mocking laugh. “I didn’t want to talk? You have a phone too! Would it have killed you to start a conversation today?” he growls. “You wanted to talk as we got here, five minutes before the most closeted double date in the history of time!” 

Groaning, Iwaizumi throws his arms up then a sputtering laugh escapes him, short and disbelieving. “Oh my god. Fine, then! Here’s the conversation: Please don’t go home with Fujiwara! I’m still figuring out all the sexuality stuff, but I know I want you!” Iwaizumi exclaims. This is not how he imagined this confession to go. As far as confessions are concerned, shouting it angrily in a karaoke bathroom is probably somewhere on a list for worst confessions ever. In spite of that, Oikawa miraculously looks to be biting back a tiny smile. Dumbfounded, Iwaizumi hesitantly reaches for the other man’s arm, and he could cry in relief when Oikawa doesn’t pull away and lets Iwaizumi’s hand curl around his. 

Oikawa shoots him a crooked smirk that doesn’t quite reach his eyes. “Bold words, but I’m not sure I believe you.” 

“But I just said—“ 

“Actions speak louder than words, Iwa-chan.” 

Iwaizumi scowls, casts a furtive glance toward the door, then leans in to press a cautious kiss to Oikawa’s lips. For a moment, it’s almost perfect. Soft and tentative, their lips slide together and Oikawa relaxes under his hands. Each time they kiss it sends a rush of electricity down Iwaizumi’s spine and this one is no exception. It's perfect, except that Oikawa’s lips are sticky with lipgloss that certainly isn’t Iwaizumi’s. He wants to erase the presence of someone else from Oikawa’s skin, but as Iwaizumi brings his hands to the other man’s waist, Oikawa breaks it off with a soft shove to his chest. “That’s not enough,” he says, a cool expression overtaking his face, “if you plan on going back in there and pretending you don’t want me.” 

It isn’t as though Iwaizumi can argue, but his face falls along with his heart. He doesn’t _want_ to go back, and he realizes exactly what Oikawa had meant by not wanting to share. Oikawa must take his silence as concession, because he shoots a quick look at himself in the mirror before shouldering his way past Iwaizumi. There’s a short burst of noise as he throws open the door and calls, “Think of something better.” Then he’s gone and Iwaizumi is alone with the dull buzz of music and fluorescent lights. 

He can’t do it. 

Iwaizumi splashes cool water on his face at the sink and sighs at his dripping reflection. Watching Oikawa and Emiko kiss is like drinking poison, and he doesn’t want to go back to that scene. It’s selfish of him. He knows that. He’s known he can’t have both Oikawa and Suzuki, and he can’t expect Oikawa to sit around when Iwaizumi is the one stringing him along. It isn’t fair to ask him not to kiss anyone else when he has done the exact same thing. It should be an easier choice than it is, except Iwaizumi has so many fears. Family and school and his hopes for the future: all could be lost if ends up being outed for dating a man. 

But if he continues to live a lie, Iwaizumi will lose Oikawa. 

He doesn’t realize his feet are carrying him back towards their karaoke room until he’s pushing open the door, saying, “Sorry, my mom called. I’ve got to go home.” 

“Awh, what?” Ayane boos. “We’re still paid up for another half hour. 

Oikawa, sitting with his arm around Emiko, tilts his head and cocks an eyebrow. “Is everything okay?” he asks. 

“Yeah, sorry,” Iwaizumi continues breathlessly, not bothering to shift his gaze from Oikawa’s curious face. “She doesn’t want me out late. Are you going to stay?” he asks, with a silent plea. _Don’t go home with her._

Both women turn to regard Oikawa who, after a moment, adopts a look of remorse and stands. “Well, if Iwa-san isn’t happy then my mom isn’t happy, so I guess I’ll be leaving too. Should we walk you two to the train?” 

Ayane narrows a suspicious look at Iwaizumi who meets it with a shrug. Emiko glances from her friend to Iwaizumi then back and whispers something quiet in Ayane’s ear. Ayane slumps with a sigh, a curt, “I think we’ll be fine on our own. It’s barely after eleven.” 

“Great. Sorry again,” Iwaizumi says with a halfhearted bow. Oikawa pauses to input his number into Emiko’s phone and the jealous embers in his chest burn a little brighter. A small smirk forms on his lips when he sees Iwaizumi’s face, and he takes Emiko’s chin between his fingers. She blushes as Oikawa kisses her one last time, a lingering, slow affair that has Iwaizumi coloring for an entirely different reason. 

_“Take_ _notes_ , Iwaizumi,” Oikawa calls. “And don’t worry, Aya-chan, he’ll get there one day.” 

Ayane doesn’t laugh. “Well, it’s been nice to meet you,” she says instead, rather unconvincingly. 

“Likewise,” Oikawa replies, also rather unconvincingly. When his back is turned to the two women, he raises a challenging look at Iwaizumi. “We better get moving,” he says with a wave at the door. Iwaizumi doesn’t even try to resist placing a leading hand to Oikawa’s back as he follows him out of the room. When they’re out on the sidewalk, Oikawa asks, “So, I’m assuming your mom didn’t call.” 

“She didn’t,” Iwaizumi confirms, eyes darting to and fro across the street. He doesn’t even want to look at the taller man but he fists his hand in the back of Oikawa’s jacket regardless. If he lets go, all Iwaizumi imagines is someone else taking his place and the jealousy in his chest blazes out of control. 

“Aright, then are you going to tell me what the hell we’re doing right now?” Oikawa gripes, though there’s a taunting lilt to his voice. “I definitely could’ve gotten laid if—“

“Oh, shut up,” Iwaizumi growls. Without another word he drags Oikawa back a few steps and pushes him down a small side street they’d just passed. “I’m trying to act!”

Oikawa doesn’t balk but he does look askance at Iwaizumi’s frustrated glare that continues bouncing around the street. “You’re _act_ ing stupid,” he mutters. 

When Iwaizumi finds what he’s looking for, Oikawa gets his answer as the shorter man pushes him into a tiny alleyway and against the wall. It’s not even an alley so much as the dark gap between two closed businesses, but they both fit, and the proximity is more than fine with Iwaizumi. No sooner does he have Oikawa where he wants him, Iwaizumi crushes their lips together in a bruising kiss. His tongue finds Oikawa’s as the man gasps his surprise; the hot, wet battle for dominance draws a moan from the back of Iwaizumi’s throat. 

He recalls that a scarce ten minutes past Oikawa was kissing someone else; they both were. A frustrated noise rumbles in his throat. “I hated watching you kiss her,” he hisses as he pulls back just enough to suck his presence into Oikawa’s neck. The other man’s fingers bite into his shoulders, a choked gasp falling from his lips as Iwaizumi paws at the topmost buttons of his shirt. 

“I-Iwa—“

“I don’t want anyone to have you like I can,” he growls between biting his way down the exposed skin of Oikawa's neck and chest. 

“I’ve felt this way for _weeks!_ We don’t always get what we want,” Oikawa argues, but his voice is too breathy and he’s grinding his obvious growing erection into Iwaizumi’s hips. “You think I like watching your _girlfriend_ all over you? Kissing you when it should be me?” 

As Iwaizumi drives him into the wall with another fevered kiss he palms him through his pants. Their tongues clash and Oikawa surrenders into the overwhelming touch with a whine. “I’m sorry,” Iwaizumi breathes against his mouth. He drags Oikawa’s bottom lip between his teeth, watches up close as the act sees Oikawa’s eyes go heavy and glazed. And then he waits, long enough for some clarity to return. When a quizzical frown pinches the taller man’s face, Iwaizumi sandwiches both his cheeks between his hands, hovers so close their noses brush and the warm air clouded around Oikawa’s parted lips becomes his own and promises, “Never again.”

Surprise and understanding and excitement all register in Oikawa’s eyes before they rejoin a moment later in a kiss just as heated as when they left it. Iwaizumi’s lips find Oikawa’s jaw, his ear, his throat, kiss down his marked neck while his frigid hands work open the button of his jeans. 

For all his arguing about not getting what they want, Iwaizumi knows he has Oikawa when he doesn’t protest Iwaizumi’s hand down his pants, despite his initial squeak at the temperature difference. It only takes a few strokes before that’s forgotten and Oikawa is moaning in his ear and clawing at his back in a desperate bid to be closer than they can manage in the circumstances. Iwaizumi’s free hand wraps around the back of Oikawa’s thigh, hikes it up so he can slot himself into the pocket of space created. “I want you, Tōru,” he growls. 

Oikawa’s fingers tighten in Iwaizumi’s hair; Iwaizumi groans and thrusts him into the wall for good measure. “You can have me,” Oikawa answers, voice teasing and heavy with implication as he squeezes Iwaizumi’s ass. 

God, Oikawa is filthy. 

Iwaizumi must be crazy. If anyone passes by and looks for more than a few seconds, he and Oikawa could be easily seen, but his solution is to huddle closer as he pumps the other man’s cock in the warmer space between them. Oikawa buries his cheek against Iwaizumi’s hair and breathes hot in his ear. Moments later though, his whole body is trembling and it is less desire and more due to freezing weather. 

“F-Fuck,” Oikawa cries, curling his cold hands beneath Iwaizumi’s shirt. “It’s too fucking cold, I can’t—“

Unwilling to let him go, Iwaizumi insists, “We don’t have to stop.” He presses his numb lips to Oikawa’s, but it does little but prove the other man’s point. “Damn it,” he groans. He admits defeat as his hand retreats from Oikawa’s jeans. Oikawa hastily buttons everything Iwaizumi has undone so he can shove his hands into his coat pockets. He holds the coat open just long enough for Iwaizumi to squeeze against him, face into his neck. 

They stay entwined in their tiny pocket of the world for a quiet, cold moment. “How much money do you have left?” Oikawa asks abruptly.

Iwaizumi understands immediately what he’s asking and a jolt of white-hot energy rockets through him. He retrieves his wallet with shaky fingers, counts and replies, “35, no, 4000 and change. Is that enough?” 

“I’ve got 3700. I think if we split it that’s more than enough for a few hours,” Oikawa answers, face lit in the glow of his phone as his fingers stumble over the glass. After a few minutes of searching, he flips the screen out towards Iwaizumi, revealing the webpage for an hourly hotel a few minutes walk from the area they’d just left. “Ah, and—“ he scrolls down the page and points— “we’re allowed.”

Even if he’s nervous, Iwaizumi huffs a thoughtful, “Huh,” at the accommodations list which affirms, ‘same-sex couples.’ They lock eyes over the top of his phone. 

“Do you want to?” Oikawa challenges. Only Iwaizumi would recognize the confident tilt to his chin as faked. There’s too much tension in his smile as he presses on, “I mean, I’d let you fuck me right here, but it’s freezing and—”

Iwaizumi covers Oikawa’s shaking hands with his, then presses a lingering kiss against the corner of his mouth. “Hey. Let’s go,” he murmurs. When he draws away, Oikawa is wearing a wistful smile that softens his features. Still holding onto him, Iwaizumi pulls them from their nook. In electric silence they walk hand in hand down the street; Oikawa unwinds his fingers before they reach the crowd. 

“Corner store first,” Oikawa declares, inclining his head towards the nearest conbini. 

“For?”

Oikawa waggles his eyebrows and grins, “Extra supplies. If we only have a few hours I want to make the most of it. And who knows if the stuff they have there is good, you know?”

Iwaizumi covers his face out of sheer embarrassment for the nonchalance with which Oikawa speaks. “R-Right,” he answers, though he does not know, because Oikawa has handled everything in this regard. 

They stop near the store when Oikawa turns and holds out an arm and says, “You can wait here. So we don’t get looks.” 

“But—”

“I’ll be fast,” he asserts, leaving Iwaizumi standing on the corner and trying to look inconspicuous. He dances from foot to foot to stay warm, glancing upward each time the store door chimes until finally Oikawa emerges. He holds the plastic bag of mystery purchases under his jacket as he approaches. “You owe me 800 yen,” he chirps. “I got snacks too.” 

“I’ll pay your share at the hotel,” Iwaizumi replies then, before he can second-guess himself, he leans in to leave a quick kiss to Oikawa’s cheek. The other man looks appropriately surprised, and they both direct their eyes elsewhere, but in a nighttime crowd growing steadily more drunk around them, they might as well be invisible. “S-So, where are we going?” Iwaizumi probes. 

Oikawa shuffles around the package under his coat so he can retrieve his phone. “Um, here. You navigate,” he says as he hands the phone to Iwaizumi. “I’ve got my hands full.” Iwaizumi snorts, though he does as he’s told and squints between the phone and their surroundings to get his bearings. 

When he’s confident in their direction he calls for Oikawa to follow. Each step feels light, like he could either drift into the sky or collapse at any moment. They’re going to a hotel. A _love hotel_. Iwaizumi’s pulse flutters at the thought. Never has he dreamed of being in this scenario, though new situations have been abundant since Tokyo. New as it is, he knows how it works because _everyone_ knows how love hotels work. Knowledge doesn’t make him any less nervous when, off another side street, they find themselves at the inconspicuous front door to one. “Here we are,” Iwaizumi says unnecessarily in an attempt to quell his nerves. 

Straightening his shoulders, Oikawa shoots him a brave smile as he marches past him to the door. “You coming?” he calls. Not one to decline a challenge, Iwaizumi hustles to join him, sliding a hand around his waist in the privacy of the empty lobby. “Okay, let’s see,” Oikawa mutters as they survey the display of empty rooms.

“T-This one,” Iwaizumi stammers, tapping the cheapest available room. “Sorry, I don’t think we can afford anything else. Is that okay?” The taller man hums his agreement, so Iwaizumi taps through the rest of the selection, still clinging to Oikawa’s waist. His heart feels ready to explode, the dredges of cold from outside already melting away as he sweats with nervous energy. 

Blinking merrily, the kiosk spits out their room ticket and, reeling, Iwaizumi takes it. His heart jumps to his throat. It suddenly seems well worth the rest of his saved allowance: this is a three-hour permission slip for he and Oikawa to do whatever they please, uninterrupted. There’s no awkward dates, no pretending for three whole hours. He marvels at it and breathes a soft, “Oh.” 

Iwaizumi is not the kind of person who expresses himself readily. It’s easier to make light or be sarcastic than it is to be forthright. The thought that crosses his mind when he looks at the room ticket is something like, _I’m so glad I can spend every minute of the next three hours with you no matter what we end up doing_ , which is far too cringe worthy to be said aloud. Oikawa is similarly guarded but on the other side of the coin, where he comes across as more genuine than he actually is. Something about this encounter though- that it’s secretive, anonymous, and solely for them- loosens that self-imposed restriction he has just a little. 

There’s a question on Oikawa’s lips when he turns his face down towards Iwaizumi, but it’s lost as the shorter man kisses him, unabashed and enthusiastic. “Let’s not waste time,” Iwaizumi grins, and understanding alights in Oikawa’s eyes. 

A quiet giggle bursts from Oikawa’s lips as Iwaizumi drags them towards the front desk where faceless hands behind a screen silently take the slip in exchange for a key. Another short kiss and they find their way to their room’s designated elevator. When the doors close Iwaizumi is wrapped in the taller man’s arms and they stagger into the wall as the elevator lurches into motion. “Three hours,” Oikawa murmurs, rolling against his chest so the bag between them crinkles. He reaches inside his coat to hold it aloft so Iwaizumi can glimpse inside: water, sweet bread and canned coffee, a bottle of lube and a small pack of condoms. Oikawa isn’t messing around; Iwaizumi shivers. Oikawa takes note and adds, “We should do it until we can’t walk.”

“Quiet,” Iwaizumi snorts before hushing the other man with another kiss. He feels giddy, drunk on the permission to _be_. It’s such a stark contrast from how he spent the last few hours that it’s surreal to think this is the same day. They pull apart as the doors open on their floor and they’re greeted with the faint noise of someone somewhere having an excellent time. With a shared look they burst into a fit of giggles. Oikawa bats his eyes innocently, asking, “Will you make that noise for me?” Iwaizumi shoves at his side and they laugh their way into their room before the door locks behind them.

While Iwaizumi was imagining something a little more reminiscent of their stint in the alley, Oikawa is immediately distracted by the tiny space. He can’t say he blames him. He’s never seen a room so… adult. It’s moody and dim, lit by a variety of lamps. One wall is covered in a weird, abstract-patterned wallpaper in varying shades of beige. There’s what looks like a mini fridge but closer inspection shows it’s just a tiny vending machine packed full of condoms and lube and toys that make Iwaizumi embarrassed just to look at. A teal couch is cramped into the corner and- wow, yeah, that’s a mirror on the ceiling. 

Holy crap. 

Iwaizumi presses his hand over his mouth as he processes, but his partner kicks off his shoes and launches himself fully clothed onto the giant bed. “Look, Iwa-chan!” Oikawa exclaims as he picks up the remote for a TV hung across from him. “You wanna watch porn?” 

It’s enough at least to shake him from his stupor at finding himself in a room designed solely for sex. Iwaizumi grumbles, “Not particularly,” while he lingers in the doorway to hang his jacket and set an alarm on his phone. His trembling knees carry him to where Oikawa is scrolling delightedly through the default TV menu. Without breaking eye contact with the screen, Oikawa pats the space next to him. Even as his body screams a resounding, _Yes!_ Iwaizumi too becomes distracted. “Are those—?”

“Heh, yeah. You can totally rent costumes,” Oikawa answers. His honey eyes pinpoint the anxious fidget in Iwaizumi’s hands and he adds, “Don’t even think about it.” 

“I’m not!” 

He is. 

Oikawa swats him on the chest but shoots a sheepish glance back at the screen before murmuring, “Which one? F-For future reference.” 

Iwaizumi’s face heats up. “I’m not telling you that!” 

Now, though, Oikawa sees a challenge which he can’t ignore. Abandoning the remote, he rolls so he can slide one long leg on top of Iwaizumi’s. “Maid?”

Iwaizumi capitulates instantly. “Bunny,” he blurts, taking a handful of Oikawa’s thigh and hiking it a little higher. 

“Ah, of course,” the taller man chuckles. The shifting mood sees Oikawa slipping a hand under Iwaizumi’s shirt and up his toned stomach. 

“Because you have… nice legs,” Iwaizumi mumbles, squeezing the back of Oikawa’s thigh before tugging at his coat. “Take this off,” he orders. He helps Oikawa shrug out of his jacket, the other man’s body like electricity under his fingers. He throws the jacket to the floor, refocuses. Oikawa’s eyes glimmer and his slender, confident fingers do the same for Iwaizumi’s shirt. This, _this_ is the mood he’d been expecting earlier as Oikawa works feverishly to get Iwaizumi out of his clothes. 

“I was hoping all night that this would happen,” the taller man confesses as he tears at Iwaizumi’s belt buckle. “Even before you brutally attacked me on the street.”

“You weren’t complaining,” Iwaizumi counters. He’s busy unbuttoning Oikawa’s shirt, running the pads of his fingers across the smooth plane of his chest, a slow moment of worship before he shoves the cloth off his shoulders. 

Oikawa grins as he shimmies out of the shirt, while Iwaizumi does the same for his own pants. “I know,” Oikawa agrees, peeling his jeans down his lean legs. “Could’ve done without everything that came before though, if I’m honest.”

What if he hadn’t said anything to Oikawa in the bathroom? It feels so much better to be giving in to what he wants than to pretend otherwise. Iwaizumi can’t disagree that everything prior kinda sucked, but he has the next three hours to start making up for it. “Me too,” he mutters, planting a kiss on the taller man’s bare neck as he pushes him against the pillows to straddle him. In the wake of his fingers which trace the contours of Oikawa’s meticulously crafted muscle, Iwaizumi licks down his torso. He savors the impatient tug of fingers in his hair that intensifies the closer he becomes to the band of his underwear. “Are you trying to make me move faster?” Iwaizumi asks lightly. 

“God, yes,” Oikawa groans, “we’ve only got three hours. If you don’t hurry up I’m going to have to switch this up.” 

Iwaizumi comes to a full stop, face impassive as he hovers above Oikawa’s midsection. “I think that just makes me want to go slower,” he teases, a smirk growing on his face in proportion to the annoyance on Oikawa’s. The impatient man narrows his eyes and tries to insist, only for Iwaizumi to intercept his hand. They lock eyes, green and brown, as Iwaizumi plants a kiss into Oikawa’s palm, then pins his wrist to his side. It’s well worth the shock in the taller man’s face when Iwaizumi shifts his weight so he can do the same to the other wrist. “Good things,” he murmurs, “come to those who wait.” 

A low whine falls from Oikawa’s parted lips as he drops back against the bed. He’s flushed all over, porcelain stained in shades of red. He can’t meet Iwaizumi’s eyes anymore, focusing on a spot on the wall like that will disguise the naked lust on his face. “I don’t want to wait,” he pleads. 

“You don’t?” Iwaizumi’s question comes while he mouths along the clothed outline of Oikawa’s cock that strains against his soft boxer briefs. Each breath that leaves him as he kisses his way down his shaft makes Oikawa writhe a little more, until Iwaizumi is tightening his grip on the slender wrists beneath his hands. Under his teasing exploration Oikawa makes another pitiful noise of want and stops straining for freedom. He’s trying to look petulant, Iwaizumi thinks when he peeks up to look, except his pinched brow and bitten lip betray him. Iwaizumi grins and throws out an arch, “Good boy,” and Oikawa’s look of reluctant arousal deepens. 

“Who even are you?” Oikawa grumbles, glaring down at Iwaizumi as he moves to sit between his legs. He chooses to ignore the sassy question in favor of nudging Oikawa’s legs wider with his knees before nipping at his inner thigh. The taller man jerks, a loud moan escaping him into the quiet room. 

“You liked it on the phone,” Iwaizumi says after he sucks a kiss into the tender skin. “Should I not say stuff like that?” He follows his question by licking a short stripe up Oikawa’s other leg that sees him whimper and twitch. 

“N-no, it’s—“ 

“No I shouldn’t?” 

With a frustrated moan, Oikawa manages, “You sh-should! I like it.”

A pleased grin curves its way onto Iwaizumi lips. Working his way back up, he sinks his mouth over Oikawa’s erection, wrenching another short cry from Oikawa’s throat. “Keep your hands to yourself and I’ll take these off,” he offers, nosing the strained, damp fabric. 

“I will!” Oikawa promises, begs, so Iwaizumi releases his hold on his wrists. Oikawa’s rebellious fingers twitch, and Iwaizumi shoots a quick look of warning that has them digging into the bedspread instead. 

“Lift your hips,” he says and Oikawa does with uncharacteristic obedience so that Iwaizumi can drag the offending garment down his legs. This part, he loves. Oikawa’s cock, flushed and leaking, bounces free as he uncovers each bit of the other man with slow reverence. His eyes follow the cloth, down the bunched muscle of Oikawa’s thighs, past his knees, over thin ankles, then travel back up his naked form once the underwear joins the rest of their clothes on the floor. 

He thinks he should probably say something that will reflect the mood- something heated, provocative. What spills unfiltered from his lips instead is a hushed, “You’re beautiful.”

An astonished expression flashes across Oikawa’s face that he schools quickly into one of self-assurance. “Obviously, Iwa-chan!” he scoffs, even as he wrings his hands together over his chest. 

Tugging at Iwaizumi’s lips is a soft smile, though he still rolls his eyes. He crawls off of Oikawa and the bed and abandons his own underwear as he retrieves the lube and condoms from the bag. When he turns back he gives Oikawa, who has sat up to watch Iwaizumi bend over, a calculating once over and says, “Your hair could do with some work,” as he points to the mirror on the ceiling. 

Oikawa’s eyes flick upwards then he drops his gaze, one hand smoothing uselessly over the messed hair on the back of his head and the other covering his exposed lap. His cheeks turn a darker shade of red as he mutters, “Oh my god. I forgot about the mirror.”

Iwaizumi tosses the items onto the bed and slots himself between Oikawa’s knees. He tips the other man’s chin upwards so their eyes meet in the reflection. “It’s kinda hot,” he growls, dropping his gaze to bite a kiss into Oikawa’s neck. 

“Who are you!” Oikawa repeats with a flustered squeak. 

Iwaizumi smiles against his skin then pushes against Oikawa’s shoulder until the other man gives. It’s the room mostly, he thinks: he has the space to shuck expectation and he has more confidence than their first time. And of course, it’s Oikawa, who has always pushed and challenged Iwaizumi. Maybe that has been geared towards school and volleyball in the past, but it is certainly the case here too. Without a word he buries his fingers into Oikawa’s hips and flattens his tongue along the length of his shaft. 

Oikawa lets loose a guttural exclamation, a shocked cry of his name as he spasms under the sudden touch. Hands slender and strong wind their way into Iwaizumi’s hair and tighten, but they don’t try to rush him this time. Iwaizumi swirls his tongue once around the flushed, swollen head, then sinks down his shaft. It’s satisfying, the gasp that Oikawa makes as Iwaizumi takes what he can without choking. _“Hajime,”_ he moans, drawing on the last syllable as Iwaizumi tightens his lips on his way back up, then he releases him to a confused whine from his partner. 

Iwaizumi scrambles for the bottle, pops the cap asking, “You want me to do this?” 

“Yes, damn it,” Oikawa breathes. 

“Not the other way around?”

“God, do you want me to beg?”

Iwaizumi smirks. “I mean—“

“ _Please_ , Hajime. I want you inside me.”

He knows Oikawa is just being facetious- his expression is just a tad too innocent to be authentic- but it doesn’t preclude the rush of heat to Iwaizumi’s face. “Damn it,” he mutters in defeat. 

Rather than gloat, though, Oikawa chews at his lip, eyes growing heavy once more. He repeats, his voice low and soft, “I want you.”

Iwaizumi swallows hard, trying to tamp down the nervous flutter in his stomach, then upends the bottle. Oikawa’s unwavering eyes are trained on him, on the cool liquid he pours onto his quivering fingers. The only time they’ve had sex, Oikawa did everything, which is a little embarrassing to admit. Iwaizumi has since done his research but he doesn’t want to make a mistake. Like always, though, they’re too in sync. “It’ll be okay,” Oikawa adds with a reassuring smile. 

So Iwaizumi nods. He watches Oikawa’s eyes flutter shut, lips parted, as Iwaizumi presses a finger against him. It sends his pulse racing, blood humming in his ears to see Oikawa like this, knees parted and moaning for him as he sinks a finger inside him. “Tōru, is—?”

“Yes, come _on,_ ” Oikawa pleads. He twitches against his hand, encourages Iwaizumi deeper so he has no choice but to oblige. He chokes down a breath as he buries his hand to the knuckle. 

“Fuck, Tōru,” Iwaizumi moans. That fire he craves and feels only with Oikawa shoots down his spine. He’s burning; he has to have more. Iwaizumi repositions just so, curves around him so he can take Oikawa’s hard length in his mouth as his finger retreats, repeats. 

“Oh, g-god,” Oikawa whimpers, tries to drive his hips up seeking the tight heat of his mouth, but he can only go so far. “You can do more, I can take it, I can—“ He trails into a breathless cry when Iwaizumi’s mouth pops off his cock. 

Iwaizumi pauses, careful, considering. He wonders if it’s too fast when he carefully works the second finger in, except Oikawa doesn’t even flinch until his hand is fully sheathed inside him. Iwaizumi freezes, searching Oikawa’s tight face for a sign. He whispers a soft, “Is that okay?” 

Oikawa bites his lip, and groans, “It’s good. It’s good! We could skip it, though.” He’s well and truly begging now, desperate and needy. “We could, we could just go right to the part where you’re inside me. Hajime, please.”

“Impatient, reckless, dumbass,” Iwaizumi grumbles. Deliberate and slow, he draws his fingers free, pushes them back in while Oikawa gasps, back arching. “That’s the same attitude that got your knee injured,” Iwaizumi lectures, thoroughly enjoying the look on Oikawa’s face caught somewhere between indignation and lust. “I know what I’m doing,” he continues with another agonizingly slow movement, fingers spread. 

It’s not like Oikawa to let it die, though. “Hah, you care about me,” he pants, half a grin on his face like saying so is a triumph. Iwaizumi chooses to preoccupy his mouth in ways that don’t involve bantering with Tōru about the obvious. He is the triumphant one, since it strips Oikawa of words that aren’t, “Yes,” and, “Fuck,” and, “Hajime.” By the time even those words devolve into breathless panting and pleas of, “Close, Hajime, m’ so _close_ , don’t stop,” Iwaizumi curls his fingers and words are gone. 

Oikawa’s hands alternate between gripping at the sheets and Iwaizumi’s hair, then settle in the latter. He thrusts into Iwaizumi’s throat, and involuntary twitch of his slim hips and Iwaizumi chokes, an obscene noise in the quiet room. He can’t stop, though, not when Oikawa is begging him for release, like a rubberband about to snap so tight around his fingers and in moments he’s trying not to cough around the hot, salty spill down across his tongue. He thinks he hears his name but it’s hard to discern around the buzz of nonsense thoughts in his head, _He’s so good, he’s so good, I want more more—_

“H-Hajime,” Oikawa sobs, a sharp noise breaks through and Iwaizumi pulls away panting around the wet string that trails from the corner of his mouth. 

Carefully he withdraws his fingers. Oikawa whimpers. “S-Sorry,” Iwaizumi gasps, but Oikawa shakes his head and tries to cover the beatific smile overtaking his face. A disbelieving chuckle escapes him, then he sits up, wraps his arms around Iwaizumi’s neck and kisses him. Iwaizumi startles, resists the urge to return the embrace because there’s the matter of his indecently sticky hand, but he recognizes that Tōru is sticking his tongue into his mouth after he just— and Iwaizumi groans and his fingers slip along Oikawa’s waist. 

The taller man separates, then rubs his thumb along the remaining wetness pooled along Iwaizumi’s chin. With a roguish smile, he slides it between Iwaizumi’s lips, across his tongue. “You gonna fuck me now or what?” he asks. 

His dick twitches as the question like electricity sparks him into motion. Iwaizumi rips open the foil packet and wrangles the slippery latex over himself before slathering more lube on top. He pauses, stomach tight at the darkness in Oikawa’s eyes: like he’s starving for him. It’s too much. “Turn around,” Iwaizumi growls. 

Not without a devilish smile does Oikawa comply. Iwaizumi wasn’t sure why he thought this angle would be any easier to manage, because he’s already forced to bite back a moan when Oikawa settles on all fours. The expanse of his muscular back, the tiny dip just before the swell of his ass that still glistens with everything that just came before, god, Oikawa Tōru is just too much. A tiny whimper escapes him; Oikawa throws a smug look over his shoulder. “Tick-tock, Iwa-chan,” he sings. 

If he lasts more than a minute he’ll be happy with himself. Not that he'd say _that_ out loud.

Inhaling, Iwaizumi holds a breath and presses the head of his throbbing cock against the inviting heat of Oikawa’s entrance. There’s resistance, the sound of Oikawa’s high-pitched whine that Iwaizumi echoes when he has to stop to catch his breath. The view. He pants, squeezes his eyes closed but the image of the head of his cock inside Tōru is already etched on the back of his eyelids. “F-Fuck,” he groans, “T-Tōru- ah, _fuck,”_ because how is he supposed to manage this when he’s not even two inches inside him? 

Oikawa gasps his name, pleading, “Hajime, you have to _move_.” And when Iwaizumi sinks in just another, shuddering inch, Oikawa buries his face in the bed and forces his hips back the rest of the way with a muffled cry. 

They’re both reduced to trembling limbs and harsh breath, and Iwaizumi is seeing stars as he takes in the feel of Tōru flush against his hips: inside hot, tight- so _tight_ \- clenched around his cock. He clings to his partner, pressing his hand to the small of Oikawa’s back. “Feels so good,” Iwaizumi chokes out finally when he draws back, watching with lewd fascination as he does. “Does it- is this okay?” 

He gets an answering moan from Oikawa when he slowly pushes back into the other man. Oikawa loosens the white-knuckled grip he had on the sheets, but his thighs and voice tremble as he gasps, “Y-Yes, god, yes, Hajime! Can you- like _that_ , faster, _please_? I n-need you—” and his voice dies out as Iwaizumi snaps his hips back in the way Tōru wants. It’s a simple rhythm, animalistic, natural. Like the last time, Oikawa is vocal where Iwaizumi isn’t. The room is filled with the sound of their bodies meeting over and over, then punctuated with Oikawa’s breathy whimpers and teasing directions. “Do you like how I feel?” he moans, heavy eyes meeting Iwaizumi’s over his shoulder. “Tell me you like it.” 

Iwaizumi wonders how Oikawa has this kind of power when he’s face down on the bed. It doesn’t even cross his mind to be anything but compliant. He can’t tear his eyes away as he tries to string together a coherent sentence. “You’re s-so good,” he pants. “Tōru- so tight, _fuck_! I can’t—!”

“You can cum inside me,” Tōru permits, voice sweet and sultry and _god_ , how can he just say things like that? So casually, like it isn’t going to hook into Iwaizumi’s thoughts and tear apart what little control he has left. Iwaizumi isn’t even sure what else he says, if Oikawa teases, if he answers. He thrusts unevenly until he’s buried to the hilt as he cums, gasping, hands clasped tight to Oikawa’s quivering hips. 

Oikawa moves, just slightly, and Iwaizumi’s breath hitches, vision white, overstimulated, but Oikawa seems undeterred by the unmoving grip around him. Iwaizumi can imagine the knowing grin the other man must be wearing, because he can’t see it, eyes squeezed tight while Oikawa rocks himself against Iwaizumi’s cock. Iwaizumi finds himself the one begging, “T-Tōru, stop!” as he pulls himself free with a strangled gasp. 

“Too much?” he asks, though his voice is too saccharine to be anything but teasing when he rolls onto his back. Iwaizumi sits back on his heels, then folds his legs under him in stunned silence. Wearing an even wider smile than before, Oikawa crawls forward whispering, “Should I clean you up?” 

Iwaizumi flushes, looks down at his lap, and stammers, “N-No!” He manages to peel off the condom without incident, stands while Tōru stretches every inch of delicious muscle out on the bed. His heart is still hammering away in his chest, but at least he’s breathing again and the stars have left his eyes. He watches the tail end of Tōru’s stretches before offering a cheeky, “You should stretch with that much care for practice.” 

“Ugh, Iwa-chan. You don’t get to harass me right now,” Oikawa whines, sitting up, arms splaying overhead. “Just help me up so we can shower and then go again.” He waggles his eyebrows. “Maybe now we’ll switch it up.”

Wearing a soft, satisfied smile, Iwaizumi pins him against the bed with a slow kiss. “Sure,” he says before snaking his arms around Oikawa’s knees and back and lifting him to his chest. Oikawa yelps then giggles as he clings to Iwaizumi’s neck. 

It’s only a few steps from the bed to the bathroom but Iwaizumi is struggling when Oikawa slides the bathroom door open. “Ooh! Hajime, put me down!” he squeals. “Look at that tub!” He gladly sets the taller man on his feet- honestly, what was he thinking- but once he straightens he sees what his partner means. The bathroom is almost as big as the room, completely tiled and fully stocked with towels and toiletries. Oikawa is leaning over the giant tub against the far wall making noises of awe. “We can both fit in here no problem!” 

“Come sit down first,” Iwaizumi chuckles as he cranks the hot water on for the handheld shower. Oikawa whips around grinning excitedly and launches himself onto the shower stool. 

“Will you wash my hair for me?” 

“Oh.” It’s an intimate suggestion Iwaizumi hasn’t anticipated. His cheeks warm at the thought of running his fingers through the silky hair outside of sex. Quashing his excitement for the sake of politeness, he asks, “Are you sure you want me to? I’m not going to dry it for you too.”

Oikawa beams, “That’s fine!” He shudders as Iwaizumi turns the stream on his back. “You have to be gentle, okay? My hair is my pride and joy,” he orders, sniffing the hotel shampoo before handing it over in approval. “Does this mean I get to wash yours?”

“If you want. Not much to wash,” he replies. Oikawa tips back his head while his locks darken and dampen, and Iwaizumi is struck again that the other man has no right looking so good soaking wet. Iwaizumi bites a kiss to his neck then hands Oikawa the showerhead so he can set to lathering his hair. “Good?” he asks as, true to Oikawa’s request, he gently rubs his blunt nails into his scalp. 

Tōru purrs his affirmation, scrubbing between his legs with an overabundance of body soap. “So good I could fall asleep,” he groans. Iwaizumi files that away for later. How many nights did Oikawa come to school with puffy eyes claiming inability to sleep? The man was a borderline insomniac. Except- Iwaizumi’s chest tightens when, in the next breath, he remembers that they’re hundreds of miles apart now. He won’t have the chance to soothe Oikawa to sleep outside of stolen time. “Hey, hey, why’d you stop?” Oikawa prods, turning his gaze back over his shoulder. 

Iwaizumi is so startled he barks a laugh in Oikawa’s face that makes him scowl. Iwaizumi laughs harder and manages to wheeze, “You, you look, so stupid!” In the course of his hair washing, Oikawa has acquired a massive halo of soapy bubbles complete with clumps of hair sticking in every direction from Iwaizumi’s hands. Iwaizumi doubles over laughing; Oikawa turns the shower spray on him. 

“Asshole,” Oikawa grumbles while he rinses the ridiculous crown from his head. Iwaizumi sputters and tries to catch his breath. 

“Oh, come on,” Iwaizumi chuckles. “It’s ugly-cute. Like in that one picture your mom has—”

“I was _five!”_

Iwaizumi laughs again until Oikawa sprays him in the face. Spluttering, he shakes his head, then throws his arms around Oikawa’s midsection and wrestles for control of the showerhead. “No, no, no!” Oikawa shrieks. “We’re going to slip and die! Iwa-chan! Nooo—!”

Iwaizumi loosens his grip and buries his face into Oikawa’s neck as he fails to choke back the rest of his laughter. After a moment, Oikawa’s giggles join him and he clings to Iwaizumi’s slippery shoulders, chest heaving. It’s a minute before Iwaizumi has finally sucked in enough air to ask, “Are you fucking done yet?” For whatever reason, it sends Oikawa into another fit of giggles. With what strength hasn’t left his oxygen-deprived muscles, Iwaizumi wrests Oikawa from the short shower stool so he can fall apart on the tile. He sprays him with water for good measure. 

“Such a brute,” Oikawa complains, but he’s still red-faced and grinning as he carefully stands. “Give me that! I’m still soapy!”

“Hurry up then!” Iwaizumi orders. He takes the chance to lather himself and starts scrubbing. Behind him, Oikawa hums something off-key while he rinses and Iwaizumi is glad he’s facing away for the warm smile that tugs at his reluctant lips. It’s so familiar, and it’s still so new. Oikawa is the person he’s known since childhood- then his lean legs carry him into view as he returns the showerhead to its rightful spot- and Iwaizumi marvels that Oikawa is also someone he's still getting to know. At some point he became a tall, handsome man with needs that he is blessedly seeking from Iwaizumi when he could be getting them from anyone else. Iwaizumi has been given a gift; he shudders to think what might have happened if he hadn’t opened his eyes to what was in front of him. 

Then Iwaizumi gives a tiny jump as Oikawa’s lips brush against his ear. He tenses when a slender hand meets his lower back, travels down and presses in, fingers teasing at his hole. “You told me to hurry up, so I started the bath and when I turned around you’re sitting here staring off into space,” Oikawa taunts. Iwaizumi flushes, toes curling at the sudden presence. “What could you be thinking about?” Oikawa muses. 

Even as his fingers draw lazy circles against him, Iwaizumi blurts, “I’m glad you went to school in Tokyo.” 

Oikawa’s hand stills, then retreats to a polite spot on his hip. “Why?” His tone is neutral which means he’s taking the statement seriously, but without seeing his face Iwaizumi isn’t sure _how_ seriously. 

“Wait! Not in a bad way. I just, because, I got used to how things were,” he fumbles, “so maybe I wouldn’t have… felt different if we’d still been together after high school.” When Oikawa doesn’t say anything right away, Iwaizumi tucks his chin and blabbers on, “I mean, it really sucks being so far apart. So I wish you _weren’t_ in Tokyo- _gah_ , I suck at this. Will you say something already?”

He feels Oikawa’s forehead come to rest against the back of his shoulder. Both hands curl around his waist. “I guess I’m glad I went too,” Oikawa offers. Warm breath on wet skin sends a shiver down Iwaizumi’s spine. “I didn’t think you’d ever look at me like this. Which was fine. I was happy being your friend,” Oikawa continues, now nuzzling at the place where Iwaizumi’s hair meets his neck, “because there was no one closer than me.”

Iwaizumi clenches his hands into fists against his soapy thighs. It’s mesmerizing, the repetitive motion on his skin. “You… you’re still… there’s no one else,” he murmurs, and it’s almost absurd how true that is. Who could possibly hope to push out Oikawa in that regard? 

“Mm, not true,” Oikawa argues with a gentle graze of his teeth at the nape of his neck. His voice is soft and dangerous. “I went to Tokyo and you went off and got a girlfriend. I tried to be a good friend about it, but if you feel something when you look at me now and this is my chance to win you over, I won’t play fair.”

It raises the hairs on his arms, and Iwaizumi shakes his head. “Tōru,” he whispers, except it comes out breathy and trembling and not at all like he wanted thanks to the hands slipping back down his body. 

“What, Hajime?” Oikawa urges. His tone teases, but so closely twined he can’t hide the anxious twitch in his normally strong hands. It’s a never ending source of frustration and endearment how Oikawa has trouble verbalizing what his body says for him, but then, Iwaizumi is cut from the same cloth. After so many years, who but each other will understand this language with the same fluency?

Iwaizumi wonders if Oikawa can glean his own response before he speaks: the relaxing of muscle, a relieved sigh. The hands around him tighten- Oikawa _knows-_ but Iwaizumi still answers, “I won’t be with anybody else.” 

He can feel Oikawa grin against his neck before he bites at his shoulder. “I’d like that,” he says. Oikawa tugs at his leg, and a red-faced Iwaizumi turns to face him. “A lot,” the taller man adds, slotting himself between Iwaizumi’s knees and running his hands along the inside of his thighs. 

Iwaizumi’s eyes flutter shut as Oikawa touches him. “I need to rinse off,” he whispers, and a few moments later the remaining soap is running into the drain and Oikawa is dragging the shorter man to his feet, insinuating his growing length against his stomach. 

“Will you wait for me in the bath?” Oikawa hums, cupping his face in his hands. Iwaizumi’s short nod earns him a long kiss, then Oikawa skips away wearing a cheery grin. 

Alone, Iwaizumi cranks off the faucet and eases into the hot water with a sigh. From the other side of the wall he hears another happy exclamation and he buries his face into his hands. What he just promised wasn't the influence of hands on his skin or a jealous night out. He already knew he couldn’t lose Oikawa. After the jealousy born tonight, Iwaizumi is more certain of that than ever. He doesn’t want to see him with someone else; he hates that Oikawa has felt this way for the duration of his relationship with Ayane. 

But if Iwaizumi wants Oikawa, then it means having a real conversation. Which is terrifying and huge and they only have a couple hours here. There is no way in hell he is going to bring up being _together_ -together as more than the _very_ hot interlude in their sex marathon. He inhales, sinks into the water up to his eyes, then exhales his jittery nerves in the form of air bubbles.

Later, for sure. 

Oikawa bursts back into the bathroom, arms full. “You want your coffee? I’m drinking mine, and you always get drowsy after a bath. It got kinda warm but that’s okay!”

“Sure,” he agrees as Oikawa starts setting items on the rim of the tub. “Are we planning to use this in here?” he asks, waving a hand at the lube and condom which Oikawa sets next to his coffee.

An innocent shrug is Oikawa’s response before he clambers next to him. “Hajime, this thing has _jets:_ they should be on!” Oikawa scolds once he’s next to him in the steaming water. He surveys the panel of buttons on the tub rim, and a few presses later they’re both exclaiming their excitement as the water bubbles. “Oh my god,” the taller man groans. He positions himself on the far side of the tub, so there’s a jetstream hitting his lower back and he can throw his legs on top of Iwaizumi’s. “When I’m rich-rich with that pro money, I’m getting one of these.” 

“Or you could save your money and go to a spa like a normal person,” Iwaizumi counters as he cracks open his canned coffee. 

“What’s the point of having a ton of money if I don’t buy stuff?” Oikawa argues. “Besides: it’s therapeutic! I can use it after practices and games. God, can you imagine sitting in this after a tournament?” He drops his head back against the wall, a blissful smile on his lips. 

He can. Oikawa’s spiel conjures images of this night repeated many times in the future. He’s always been the one to make sure Oikawa’s post-tournament self-care was appropriate (a ritual beginning after finding a thirteen year old Tōru practicing obsessively into the night following a loss). So why shouldn’t Iwaizumi have the privilege of making sure a professional Oikawa soaks in the tub after a long day? The man needs a babysitter as much as a trainer. It makes him smile around the rim of his coffee. 

Oikawa peeks open an eye and Iwaizumi is grateful that the hot water has already pinkened his entire body. “What?” the athlete says suspiciously. 

“I was just thinking that idea didn’t sound totally stupid after all,” Iwaizumi smirks. A pouting Oikawa tips the bottom of the can with his foot as he takes a drink, just enough to make him choke. “Okay, now I’m going to drown you,” Iwaizumi coughs. 

Oikawa gives a haughty laugh until Iwaizumi sets down his drink at which point he emits a tiny squeak. Of course, the moment Iwaizumi has his arms on either side of Oikawa, all thoughts of vengeance evaporate from head. In the brief pause that ensues, Oikawa’s eyes track the trickle of water down Iwaizumi’s chest. Then in an unspoken agreement, they adjust until Iwaizumi is seated in Oikawa’s lap, capturing his mouth in a heated kiss. 

A muffled groan bubbles in Iwaizumi’s throat when Oikawa’s hand slips below the waterline, cups at his sack, and eventually takes both their cocks in hand without breaking the stride of their kiss. Even if he’s not as nervous as he was earlier, it doesn’t mean Iwaizumi is any less feverish under Oikawa’s touch. He rolls his hips into the other man’s hand with an unrestrained moan of his name that has Oikawa tear away from his lips to suck at his neck.

“Have you decided against drowning me?” Oikawa teases when he backs off long enough for Iwaizumi to catch a breath. 

“You get a pass,” Iwaizumi huffs, grasping at Oikawa’s damp hair to urge his mouth back into place against his throat. He leans to grant Oikawa access when his tongue starts drifting down towards Iwaizumi’s chest. “How do we do this?” 

Oikawa chuckles, “Now who’s the impatient one?” 

“ _Oikawa,”_ Iwaizumi groans.

“If you’re that eager, we can switch places,” the taller man suggests with a pointed look at his lap where Iwaizumi is sitting.

Iwaizumi tilts his head, then understanding hits him. It isn’t to say he isn’t interested, because the idea has his cock twitching against Tōru’s palm. How it looked, how it _felt_ \- yes, he could definitely fuck him again. Still, he opens his mouth, then pauses. If he doesn’t want Oikawa to make fun of him for the rest of his life, he has to consider his words carefully. “You seemed… excited earlier. About switching places,” he offers, “and I’m not going to say no if that’s what you want.” He’s grateful again for the hot water, because, despite the nonchalant expression he’s pretty sure he’s nailing, his face is on fire. 

A foxy smile curves it’s way over Oikawa’s lips and Iwaizumi winces because there’s no way that he’s leaving this conversation with his dignity intact. He’s already preparing to argue that he’s totally suggesting this for Oikawa’s sake, _not_ his own when, when Oikawa says easily, “Well I won’t pretend I don’t want to fuck you. Are you sure?” 

“If you want to, it’s fine,” Iwaizumi insists. He swears he’s still frowning but Tōru’s grin shows his teeth now, a flash of white before he nibbles at Iwaizumi’s tan collarbone. 

“Well, if it’s fine,” Oikawa purrs, “then we should probably get out of the tub.” It takes exorbitant willpower not to leap from the hot water before the other man has finished talking, but Iwaizumi manages a slow kiss to Tōru’s grinning mouth before he unwinds himself from his lap. 

He’s still a little surprised he made it out without being harassed. He knows Tōru: if Iwaizumi were to _ask for this_ , Tōru would have capitalized on it to tease him mercilessly. It isn’t like Iwaizumi can’t take Tōru’s shit or give it as good as he gets: he’s just… at a disadvantage in this arena. None of this seems to fluster Tōru the way it does Iwaizumi- the man is shameless. Simply asking for Tōru to top feels like being sentenced to death by teasing.

But that is what he wants: he wants Tōru to fuck him, and he’s surprisingly unsure if the unavoidable teasing isn’t as much a part of his want as the sex.

Huh.

He’s mostly dry when Tōru attaches to him like a long-limbed leech, chest flush to his back and sings, “Will you hold onto the sink for me?”

“Excuse me?” Iwaizumi frowns, but Oikawa has already ground an insistent palm between his shoulder blades and started pushing before his question is even finished. With a tiny curse Iwaizumi’s hands flash out and grab hold of the sink. He’s not a moment too soon: Oikawa tugs at Iwaizumi’s hips and nudges his legs apart with his foot. It’s a matter of seconds; Iwaizumi shoots a frantic look back at his partner. “W-Wait a second! Stop!”

He does, but not without an appreciative hum for the ninety degree angle of Iwaizumi’s back. “Sorry,” Oikawa apologizes, tracing the ridges of his spine before inching away. “Should I wait until you’re on the bed?”

Scowling into the sink, Iwaizumi’s fingers twitch against the porcelain but stay in their place. God damn Oikawa Tōru. “It’s… I was just… surprised,” he mumbles, head dropping a little further out of embarrassment. Realization dawns that Tōru was _not_ going to let him out of this so easily. _Please don’t make me say it_ , he pleads. 

Blessedly, Tōru doesn’t leave him hanging entirely: the warm friction of calloused fingers slides around his ass. The taller man makes another pleased noise. “So then, you’re saying you want me to finger you open like this?” he inquires sweetly. 

The question ignites the entirety of Iwaizumi’s body: need, arousal, conflict. Modesty and ego urge him to stand, far too conscious of being so vulnerable, so _submissive._ Except both are being overwhelmed by the urgent, unrelenting desire to be touched. “Oikawa,” he warns, teeth gritted.

“Hm?” 

They’re both quiet and Oikawa’s hands are infuriatingly still. It wears at Iwaizumi’s inhibitions. “Just do something,” he groans. He’s all too aware of the pathetic whine that tints his demand. 

Tall, devilish Oikawa leans over his back, lips on the nape of his neck. There’s so much contact- the heat of skin and the hard length of Oikawa’s cock pressed into his ass- and Iwaizumi can feel his reservations crack like glass. “Will you tell me what you want me to do?” Oikawa asks, voice low and persuasive. 

Iwaizumi could ignore him and choose not to play the game. He’d still get the same result because there’s no chance Oikawa will actually withhold when they’re both so wound up. He cringes to realize that he’s choosing to play along because he likes how it feels to be forced into the dirty talk that’s so embarrassing for him. 

Wow, maybe he’s broken.

But even as he wonders, his clumsy tongue is stumbling over the words, “I want you to… to f… f-finger me.”

“Fuck, that’s so hot,” Tōru moans as he shifts his weight off of Iwaizumi’s back. The rim of the sink is cooling against his flushed face, so Iwaizumi doesn’t move as Tōru carefully repositions. Not until Tōru adds, “But too bad. I want to try something else first,” the words breathed a second before his tongue flicks out against the exposed flesh of Iwaizumi’s hole. 

It shocks the breath right out of his lungs and instinct wants him to flinch, except Oikawa’s hands are wrapped around his thighs and the slick floor could be dangerous if he moves too quickly. A high, breathy sob is wrenched from his throat, a sharp noise that echoes in the tiled chamber and sounds nothing like anything he’s ever heard from himself before. “W-wait, stop—“ he cries, and Tōru does, even if he doesn’t rise from his knees. “You sh-shouldn’t,” he tries, but his voice is no less shaky than the rest of his body. 

“Are you saying that because you don’t like it at all, or because you’re embarrassed that you do?” Tōru replies like he’s in his goddamn mind. “Because you should at least know me well enough to know I wouldn’t do it if I didn’t want to.” 

“Um.” Iwaizumi stares daggers at the sink drain and wills his uncooperative knees to stop trembling. His breath comes shallow in anticipation of the words he cannot believe he’s about to say. “The, um, the s-second one…” he whispers. 

The fingers digging into the muscle of his thighs squeeze and there’s a note of teasing in Tōru’s voice as he says, “Then let me do it, Hajime.” Iwaizumi breathes a shaky curse, and this time he manages to keep his outcry to a respectable volume when the other man’s tongue prods at him again. 

In his Incognito browsing sessions, he’d read about and promptly dismissed this kind of thing. _Who actually does that,_ he’d judged, which is karmic retribution because of course, Tōru would. It’s tearing him apart in the best way, the apparent dichotomy of being both aroused and thoroughly embarrassed by the wet, hot probe of Tōru’s tongue against him, _inside_ him. He’s clinging for his life to the bath fixture in an effort not to collapse, but each slow movement of Tōru’s lips wrests another involuntary moan from Iwaizumi’s mouth. Under the exaltations of Tōru’s tongue, he converts: Iwaizumi would do this for him in a heartbeat just for the sheer pleasure of discovering the noises he would make. 

He’s so taken that he doesn’t register for several ragged breaths that Tōru has replaced his tongue with a slicked up finger. 

Iwaizumi’s feet slip as he jerks, only to be steadied by Oikawa’s firm grip. “That’s okay, right?” the kneeling man checks. Whatever angle his hand is at- Iwaizumi can’t fathom trying to look- has his finger brushing against his prostate 

“Yeah,” Iwaizumi gasps, “it’s good, _fuck—“_

“I like it when you feel good,” Tōru purrs as his teeth graze his backside and his finger hypnotically does its work. “Want you to like it when I touch you. I’m the only one who gets to see you like this, right, Hajime?” Iwaizumi’s muscles tense: Tōru is adding another finger, but he can’t focus on the sting, not when Tōru’s repeating, voice more insistent but still dripping like honey, “Tell me I’m the only one.”

“You are,” Hajime swears. He can practically feel Tōru’s smile on his skin as he presses a kiss to the back of his thigh. Of course there’s no one Iwaizumi could trust in this like Tōru, no one who he wants like Tōru. After so many years, he believes with certainty that Tōru, though he may enjoy tormenting him, wouldn’t ever mistreat him. He hopes Tōru knows the same. 

Like being roused from a dream, Iwaizumi finally lifts his head full of cotton as Oikawa shuffles to his feet with a soft grunt. “Your knee,” Iwaizumi mumbles, turning to assess, but Oikawa places a placating hand on his back. 

“It’s fine,” he assures. Their eyes meet for the first time since Iwaizumi chained himself to this spot. Oikawa’s wearing a fond expression, a soft thing that grows hungry at the dazed look of Iwaizumi’s face. “I don’t want you to move; I’m not done yet,” he says as he slips his fingers back inside the shorter man. 

Even as he falls back into position, Iwaizumi gasps, “You don’t think that’s enough?” 

“So impatient,” Oikawa grins, echoing his earlier sentiment. The hand not preoccupied tangles in the short strands of Iwaizumi’s hair and pulls.

He’s forced to follow the motion if he doesn’t want to lose hair, and he realizes that must have been Oikawa’s plan when he blinks face to face with his reflection. Wild-eyed and flushed, Iwaizumi meets the gleeful bright face of his partner in the mirror, who confesses, “I love the faces you make when I’m doing this. You’re so fucking hot.” 

Iwaizumi squeezes his eyes shut to his reflection and groans, “Shut up.” There’s no way he can look again. Even a brief glance showed someone he didn’t recognize: olive eyes glossed and heavy, cheeks rosy, swollen lips parted and eyebrows drawn. “I-I’m not…” He trails off, unable to bring himself to finish. 

“Maybe you should look again, then,” Oikawa suggests. He leans in, bringing his rough voice closer to Iwaizumi’s ear. “I get to watch you come apart, and all those faces are because of me. God, when you look like that, all I can think about is fucking you, seeing your face when my cock’s inside you—“

Tōru’s name is a whimper on Iwaizumi’s lips as he cracks open his eyes. It’s hard to reconcile that the fucked out face in front of him is his. Iwaizumi presses his lips together into a pout and sulks silently at Tōru’s reflection. He gets it though: he feels the same when it’s Tōru wearing the look of hot-blooded desperation. And _maybe_ it jumpstarts a spark to see himself this way, but he’d rather look at Tōru, who’s burning with inner fire, who never approaches tasks halfheartedly, and whose powerful determination is currently geared wholly towards Iwaizumi’s pleasure. 

_That_ is the thought that turns him on. 

The fingers twined in his hair disappear, and Iwaizumi lets his head fall down towards the sink. He’s aching with need now that Oikawa has so thoroughly teased him open, so when wayward fingers reappear and encircle his heavy, hard cock, Iwaizumi’s knees buckle. “ _Fuck,_ Tōru, please—“ he begs. 

“You’re _dripping_ ,” Tōru marvels, coating his palm in the slick rivulets of precum that have accumulated down the length of Iwaizumi’s shaft. “Do you want me that bad? Should I make you cum?”

The shorter man pants, “Goddamn it, yes,” shameless with need. There’s a tremble in his thighs now- too much time upright and aroused- but his hips can’t decide which of Tōru’s skilled hands they want to seek first. 

He gasps when the choice is taken from him as Oikawa releases him entirely. “I will. When I’m inside you,” Tōru purrs. He takes a step back to allow Iwaizumi the chance to straighten, then catches his first fumbling step. A short, sloppy kiss is shared, then Iwaizumi pushes Oikawa out of the bathroom ahead of him. For good measure, he slaps his ass; the resulting squeak and shoving match is worth being pushed down on the bed. 

For a split second, he’s shy again: he catches a brief glimpse of his exposure in the ceiling mirror, sprawled on his back. He’s so hard it’s on the brink of pain, cock flushed against his stomach. Then Tōru enters his line of sight and takes control of his legs, so there’s no focusing on anything that isn’t him. Firm hands push back his thighs, and Iwaizumi is moaning at the way Tōru fills him in one smooth motion. The taller man pauses only for a moment. It’s not long enough for Iwaizumi to catch his breath, and he’s left scrambling for a hold on the sheets as Tōru pulls out and thrusts back in, hard and fast. 

There aren’t words for it; whatever Iwaizumi might’ve said is lost in a strangled gasp. It isn’t the delicate affair of the first time, though that’s not to say Tōru is careless. Hajime can see in the way that the other man is watching that he’s attentive for any sign that he should change the pace, but that won’t come from Hajime. Rougher it may be, but with the build up he’s endured it’s exactly what he needs and he takes greedily what Tōru is giving. He’s aware that Tōru’s talking- when is he not- but whatever lewd comments he’s making die off when Hajime issues him a challenge, a gravelly, pleading, _“More.”_ In a rare move of compliance, Tōru adjusts without a contrary or taunting word. Caramel eyes blaze bright as he moves each of Hajime’s muscular legs until his ankles hook over his shoulders. Hajime is only afforded the time for his eyes to widen before Tōru’s weight is bearing down on his legs and his cock is bearing down on the spot inside him that has Hajime shouting a broken, “F- _Fuck!”_

Maybe he didn’t quite understand what he was asking for when he asked for more. 

It’s not unlike Tōru’s least favorite stretch which Iwaizumi has forced upon him hundreds of times in the past, knees in towards his chest to stretch the oft-neglected hamstring. Perhaps vengeance is in part fueling the voracious grin on Tōru’s lips, close enough that Hajime can brush a finger against them but not close enough to kiss. The man’s silver tongue laps against it before he says, “Good?” as if he can’t tell that Hajime is fighting to keep his eyes from rolling back. 

With startling speed Hajime finds himself hurtling towards some sort of release like this. He loses the battle for control over his face, but his attempts to cover it are thwarted when Tōru pins his wrist to the bed. Tōru’s relentless dominance rips another wordless cry from Hajime’s throat, but when he gazes down at him, there’s so much warmth contained in his blazing eyes that Hajime can’t bear to turn away until the pressure built inside him makes it impossible. He blindly begs, “Don’t s-stop,” as he clings to Tōru’s arm with the hand that isn’t caught in a vice-like grip against the sheets. 

“Hajime, baby- for me, _yes_ —!” and it isn’t like Hajime to deny Tōru what he wants. For a small eternity, Hajime forgets how to breathe, forgets anything that isn’t the white-hot explosion of pleasure that tears through him. Then, air fills his lungs and a shuddering gasp precedes a stream of broken words- praise and curses and Tōru’s name- that fall from his lips as his brain restarts from white static. Awareness of his body returns to him in bits and pieces: his toes curled by Tōru’s ears, then his fingers still clenched around Tōru’s, the stretch in his legs, and the throb of his cock, still dribbling across his stomach. He throws himself back against the bed with a ruined cry when Tōru moves, languid and careful but still inside him where the pulsing sensitivity is nearly overwhelming. 

He thinks he might be crazy; he groans, “K-Keep going.” 

“Hajime,” Tōru replies in a tone which agrees that Hajime is definitely crazy. As if to prove his unspoken point, he makes a small adjustment by settling back into their original position, and when Hajime’s legs drop back to his elbows the shorter man writhes with an airy sob. 

Despite his swimming vision, Hajime shakes his head and urges, “It’s fine. Tōru, Tōru, please, I want—” The expression of his wishes ends prematurely in a whimper as his partner slowly pushes his way fully to the hilt. 

Tōru is panting too and his eyes are just as unfocused as Hajimes’s. He moves again and Hajime’s entire body shudders with it, but he manages to keep the resulting moan from reaching previous volumes. “God, Hajime,” the taller man repeats, lashes coming to rest against his flushed cheeks. He cradles the twitching legs beneath his hands as he continues to test the limits of Hajime’s dwindling sensitivity with his exploratory movements. “That was…” Tōru starts and never finishes, not the only one apparently lacking full control of their higher functioning. This time, they share a soft whine as Tōru pulls out of him entirely. “Roll over,” he orders huskily, tugging at Iwaizumi’s hips. 

He bites his lip at the friction on his still-sensitive cock- his sensitive _everything-_ but Hajime waits from his new position on his stomach. The cool brush of liquid against him sees him flinch, but a hiss turns into another drawn out groan as Tōru slides back inside him. It’s a mercy that Tōru moves without their earlier haste, but every thrust still has Hajime muffling cries into the mattress. Above him Tōru moans, voice warm and high and unfettered along the back of his neck, “No way I can last after that. So hot, you’re so _hot_ —”

Hajime tries, but he hasn’t stopped shaking, so his voice trembles against the sheets when stammers, “I, I want you to c-cum, Tōru.” 

“Where?” Tōru manages to bite out. He sounds like he’s about to snap. “Where do you want it?”

With the way his cock is throbbing inside him, Hajime could say nothing and Tōru would still be over the edge in seconds. “Inside me,” he gasps instead, fisting the sheets in a desperate attempt to steady himself against the erratic movement of Tōru’s hips. He needn’t have, because like he predicted, Tōru cums in the next breath, bucking into him with noisy moans until his motion becomes slow and uncoordinated. When at last he’s finally spent, he collapses onto Hajime’s back with a wheeze. 

“I’m dead,” Tōru whispers. 

Hajime is lying in a mess of his own making and he might actually be drooling. He cannot bring himself to care. “Me too,” he sighs. They lay like that for another moment until Tōru chuckles and the movement of his chest makes Hajime all the more aware of his weight. “Get off me,” he begs, “before I suffocate.” 

With another whine, Tōru peels himself off of Hajime’s back and rolls over onto his side. Hajime turns his head to face him but otherwise doesn’t move. “I know I said we should use all three hours,” Tōru recalls, “but I might actually die if we do.” 

“I might never walk again, so, whatever.” 

At the reminder, Tōru’s face grows a touch more lively. “What did that feel like? You look like you ascended.”

“Oh my _god_ , shut _up_ ,” Hajime exclaims, burying his warming cheeks into the mattress again. 

Undeterred, Tōru tickles his ear and coos, “Come on: I like praise; tell me I did good!” 

Hajime can feel his face burning all the way up to the ears Tōru is prodding. He tries to adopt a frown but there’s no way it looks anything but pouty as he looks at Tōru and says, “It… felt really, _really_ good.” Whatever. Tōru knows he isn’t a poet. It’s just enough to make his partner preen and not pester him for more. 

Tōru plants a kiss on the tip of Hajime’s nose then rolls to his feet so he can begin taking care of his end of the mess. “You should get up, you know,” he says. “You’re going to start sticking if you lay there any longer.”

“Fine,” he huffs, pushing himself to his elbows with more difficulty than he would like to admit. It isn’t just that his legs are still the consistency of jelly: his skin prickles with every brush of fabric, and when Tōru places a helpful hand on his shoulder, the touch sends a shiver across his body. It takes him a moment to get sitting upright, at which point Tōru snickers at the absolute wreck they’ve made of the bed. Hajime squints down at his chest and blurts a quiet, “Wow.” 

“Yeah, ‘wow,’” Tōru agrees, chest puffed with pride. Hajime shoves him. It only makes him giggle harder. 

When there’s no more procrastinating, Hajime lets the other man pull him to his feet and fuss over him all the way into the bathroom. “Will you check how much time is left?” he asks once he’s hobbled onto the shower stool with a groan. He feels ridiculous, and he really, _really_ wants to pay Tōru back in kind some time in the near future. 

Tōru darts off to do as asked- so compliant after sex- and calls back, “About an hour,” as he rushes back in. “Also you got a text from, um, Suzuki.”

Hajime hangs his head, shakes it, then turns on the water. “C’mere. You owe me,” he says, reaching for the soap. 

Still lingering in the doorway, Tōru wrings his hands and mutters, “Are you sure?” 

The tension is all too obvious on Tōru’s face when Hajime regards him. It evokes a lingering sense of shame for him; he knows how much anxiety it has caused his partner. Hajime offers up a hand and a soft smile. “I’m sure,” he replies.

  
  
  


(They’re trying for one more time in the tub when Iwaizumi’s ten-minute alarm goes off.)

  
  
  


***

It isn’t until they’re back outside in the cold reality of winter that it hits Iwaizumi where they’ve gone wrong. 

“Oikawa.” 

“What?” 

He turns to look at the taller man wearing a deadpan frown. “We’re fucking stupid.” 

A flash of confusion passes across Oikawa’s face before quickly becoming resigned. “We didn’t factor in getting home,” he surmises. “How much money do you have left? I think I have-“ he digs in his pockets- “oh, hah. 200 yen.”

Iwaizumi can’t help but laugh. “Fuck. I’ve got 400. We’re gonna have to wait for the first train.” 

Oikawa slumps against his shoulder with a groan. “That’s still almost two hours! We’ll freeze to death if we have to wait for the train. No! We’ll get mugged. Iwa-chan, I’m too pretty to get mugged!”

“Okay, well first of all, you look half dead right now.” 

“Hey!”

“Second of all,” Iwaizumi presses on, his lips twitching upward at Oikawa’s sulky glare, “no one will mug us since we look exactly like broke college students.”

“Oh. Yeah, that’s true.”

“Thirdly, you can’t freeze to death in a subway tunnel. Just, um, sit close to me, okay?” Iwaizumi finishes ignoring the growing smile on Oikawa’s face. 

“Loser, you care about me,” Oikawa grins, pressing a teasing finger to Iwaizumi’s cheek which he swats away. 

He huffs a soft, “Obviously,” before continuing in a louder voice, “Let’s go. We’ll warm up as we walk.”

Oikawa sidles up next to him, grabs his hand and twines their fingers before shoving them both into his jacket pocket. “You didn’t even try to deny that you’re a loser,” he teases. 

“Shut up,” the shorter man grumbles. He squeezes Oikawa’s hand but doesn’t dare try to pull it back. 

***

The phone rings three times before Oikawa Kaoru, in the midst of packing her lunch, manages to pick it up. “Hello?”

“Sorry to bother you before work,” Iwaizumi Fumi’s voice answers on the other line. “Did Tōru come home last night? Hajime didn’t, and he didn’t leave a message.”

“Hey Fumi. Hold on one sec, I’ll go check,” she answers. Those two were growing up way too fast. It seemed surreal that her youngest child was now old enough to stay out all night. Of course, her son had texted that they had missed the last train and would be home in the morning, but she hadn't actually checked to see if they'd come in. “I would expect that from Tōru, but not Hajime. I thought we raised our sons to be more considerate,” she jokes. 

“So did I,” Iwaizumi-san replies drily. 

Kaoru snickers and presses a soft knock to Tōru’s door before turning the handle. For a brief pause she takes in the sight, then she presses the phone back to her ear and whispers, “Yeah, they’re both here. Do you want me to wake him up?” 

On the other end, Fumi breathes a sigh of relief. “No it’s okay. I’ll chew him out later,” she replies. “Thanks for checking. Sorry again to bother you!”

They say their goodbyes and hang up, and Kaoru peers back through the cracked door, a pensive look on her face. 

It looks like they’d just stumbled in and collapsed, too exhausted to bother with a futon. They’re cuddled in Tōru’s too-small bed, her son’s face tucked against the back of Hajime’s neck. The outline of Tōru’s arm across Hajime’s back is traceable, as are their entwined legs. She can’t recall them sleeping like that since they were eight, when it was adorable. Before they knew to care. 

As adults, it’s enough to make her wonder, but she shakes the thought from her head and shuts the door.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have to tell this joke because it didn't make it into the story. I was going to write: "Under the exaltations of Tōru’s tongue, he converts to the church of eating ass," but I didn't have enough of a humorous mood leading up to it and it felt too out of place. QQ


End file.
